Al Horford will miss at least a week for the Warriors with sciatica, per Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area (via Twitter).
The injury is being classified as right sciatic nerve irritation, according to Anthony Slater of ESPN (Twitter link), who notes that Horford will be out for at least three games: Monday vs. Utah, Wednesday vs. Houston, and Saturday vs. New Orleans.
Horford is currently averaging the fewest minutes, points, rebounds, and assists per game of his career, as well as his lowest three-point percentage in 11 seasons, as he adjusts to coming off the bench for Golden State.
Sciatica is the same type of medical issue that kept LeBron James sidelined for the Lakers’ first 14 games, though the wording on Horford seems to suggest that his ailment is less severe than James’ was.
The Warriors have cooled off since their 4-1 start to the season and are now 9-9 after losing their last three games. Horford’s injury will provide yet another test for Golden State’s frontcourt depth, as Jonathan Kuminga remains out with knee tendonitis and Draymond Green is listed as questionable for Monday’s game with a foot sprain.
Gramps has sciatica pain, how unpredictable
Horford is experiencing buyers remorse, things haven’t gone swimmingly as anticipated—Kerr has no idea how to coach.
Horford caused his injury? That is ridiculous.
I doubt that. Playoff Al is getting paid 2 or 3 times what he would have if he stayed with the Celtics. Probably his last big payday and he has lots of family to take care of. Plus he gets to experience California. And we still love him in Boston. He brought us our 18th NBA title.
I’m guessing he has been injured all year, his 3 has been way off, usually he is ice cold and a leader. He has looked hobbled since game one, lets hope he gets everything healed up and GSW gets the Celtics version of Al.
Question for all Warriors fans: so is Seth Curry gunna fix this problem?
They have no room for more undersized guards, yall. They should reneg and not sign him and instead sign James Wiseman or literally any FA big body 7 footer out there.
Any skilled 7 footer who could help the Warriors is already signed. And, they will cost way more than Seth Curry. Minimum contract would be $10 million.
Wiseman needs to get healthy and then go to Europe and develop his game.
It honestly blows my mind how easy it is to beat smallball, you just play all bigs and iso on offense and back down the smaller player for the easy bucket. Small ball never played defense to begin with, it’s not the point, the point is to rain volume 3’s in to blow the game out quickly, then return to the bigger lineups to add rebounding. The only reason the Warriors won with it in 2022 was because of the volume 3 ball, which no other team can do consistently because they don’t have Steph, Klay and Poole, this includes the post Klay/Poole Warriors, who for some reason (as I have pontificated in other posts, I believe its pure ego and the fantasy of Kerr wanting to play 5 Steve Kerr’s at once) cannot understand this. Kerr runs either small ball or Hampton’s 5 plays with not-the Hampton’s 5. I have no idea why he still has defenders, he always looks so bored out there, he’s not a good coach or even likeable. MJ punched him for a reason. He also told Poole to say the thing that made Dray punch him. Kerr stinks and has got to go. He should have phased out small ball in early 2024. What an idiot.
Small ball has been around for 50 years. Before Kerr was even in High School. It has its roots in the Celtics teams of the 60s. How many back-to-back rings did they win? The Warriors have been playing it for the past 40 years. The NBA has fully adopted it. To late to go back.
Poole got lucky one season. He is nothing more than a Sixth man. After watching him play in DC, Kevin Garnett said that doesn’t deserve to be in the NBA.
Do you ever have anything positive to say?
The death penalty/transphobia guy wants you to be positive when interacting with his foolery…
Claiming that the Bill Russell Celtics played smallball is 100% absurd. Here’s 1965, 4 players at least 6’10” on the roster.
link to basketball-reference.com
Don Nelson is the father of small ball. He played for the Celtics in the 60s. That is where he got his inspiration from, according to him. Position-less basketball is a better term. It just means that players are more skilled and mobile. They can play multiple positions. Height isn’t that important.
So GSW being 22nd in rpg is because our players aren’t “skilled and mobile” enough, eh?
It has nothing whatsoever to do with our 2 tallest and best rebounders per minute being 10th and 12th in min/gm, right?
The Warriors were 7th last season. Signing a random 7 footer isn’t going to help that.
That’s a huge difference year to year. I bet a random 7 footer would rebound better than Melton and Seth will!
They are also 4th in turnovers. They are struggling to play fundamental basketball.
Just making up stuff to argue with me…bro should just mute me, neither of us are benefiting from our interactions. you do not have to reply to me, id rather you didn’t. you never have anything positive to say about anything, its annoying.
The Celtics won in 2024 with volume 3s an the next year broke the record for most 3s in a season. It’s funny you think Steph and Klay are the only ones that can win that way lol
He is obsessed with bashing the most successful coach in Warriors franchise history, Steve Kerr. He also believes that Kerr has been controlled by Islamic Jihad for the past 40 years. He also thinks that Kerr is a Nepobaby despite him being the only one to pursue a career in basketball in his entire family.
lol that’s wild. Davey J does keep the comments section fun though and I think often times he’s trying to inject humor. I think a lot of those types of things he says are just for lulz, but he definitely doesn’t like Kerr.
@giants47 Nepo babies don’t have to stay in the same career as their parents btw, another thing you are wrong about in order to “prove me wrong” even though I am proven correct time and time again on here..
Just stop replying to me if you have nothing positive to say. It’s lame and boring arguing with you, have no good points ever btw please mute me if you hate me takes so badly you have to resort to lying about them.
Kerr’s parents never played professional sports. Kerr has not been in Academia. How can he be a Nepobaby?
Kerr did say yesterday he is thinking iof putting Post in teh starting lineup because the bigger players are just killing the warriors. So kerr is figuring it out small ball is no longer the best lineup.
We needed to start Post all season long, he is healthy and better than Al at this age. His defense is improving too. TJD also at the 4 needs to happen more.
Steph Jimmy Dray TJD Post needs serious run time together, not “bench the bigs after 5 minutes for 4 undersized SGs” crap the lame duck Kerr keeps doing.
Your first post when they picked Post’s option for this season is he should be trade fodder.
Maybe, but Al Horford was a huge part of the Celtics winning #18. Terrific team player, got the Celtics passing & moving, blocked shots and turned himself into an elite three point shooter.
Which is why GSW signed him.
What a disappointment he’s been – 5.8 ppg (2.8 ppg below his Celtics title season avg) on 34% overall (16.5% below his career avg) and 32% from three (10% below his Celtics title season avg).
Hopefully he can get healthy at some point…
I felt before the beginning of the season that they should start Post. Then have Horford come off the bench with Kuminga for the very reasons you stated. Kerr hinted that he wanted to play the two together.
Harford is a better defensive player than Post but teh warriors knew coming in he was not available for a long period of time.
Kerr has never had any problem playing bigs. The problem has always finding players with the skill level to fit into a successful team. Wiseman struggled because he basically went from High School to a defending Championship team. Bigs always take longer to develop than guards.
@TunaNoCrust
Where did I say that? The Celtics did not play undersized guards, Tatum and Porzingis are not 6’2″, its not the same thing. It’s funny how bad your reading comprehension skills are lol
Your analysis is correct overall, sometimes I’m analyzing, sometimes I’m trying to be funny, but yes, I despise Steve Kerr the generational rider of superior talents. He has always been a net negative on every champion team he was lucky enough to be on, shooting empty 3’s and that’s it.
Lets talk about @giants74 never has anything positive to say on here though, like, what is your point? Be more “yes, and” not “no, you are wrong because I say so with no backing information”. That is crappy posting, be better bro
also no one has answered my question: what is Seth Curry supposed to do on this lopsided Warriors roster? Shoot a 3 and play zero defense while being 6’1″180 lb? What’s he gunna do vs Wemby?
Seth is the 3 pt shooter off the bench. Buddy has been horrible. Also Seth can be an extra ball handler. If Wiseman awas good he would have been picked up by now. If they are not goping to use Santos very much they should trade him and use the money on a g big. That is teh other thing the warriors have no money to spend.
Coming into the, I was interested in Moody’s recovery and how Richard would develop. Signing Seth allows them to move Heild who basically has an expiring contract. They also have a trade exception out there that they might be able to use in a 3 team trade.
Buudy has a player option next year hopefully its not full option. I don’t see himopting out because how hs ie playing he is not going to get a better one.
He is only guaranteed $3 million, and it doesn’t vest until after the draft. A team could save $7 million.
that is good news can save the warriors $7 million next year and makes him a better trading chip
“ Seth Curry supposed to do on this lopsided Warriors roster? Shoot a 3 and play zero defense while being 6’1″180 lb? What’s he gunna do vs Wemby?”
The same thing his brother would do against Wemby. Nothing!! lol
Can’t wait to watch Kerr play Seth at the 3 and GP2 at the 4!!
lmao
“The same thing his brother would do against Wemby. Nothing!! ”
Lol @ your comment – apparently you missed what Steph did to Wemby and the Spurs in winning 2 straight games this month. He scored 46 and 49 in the 2 games on 57%/42%/96% splits 4.5 rpg 3.5 apg 2.0 spg
We were talking defense obviously *facepalm*
The only facepalm belongs to you, given what happened in the matchup
The thing is. I doubt any current FA 7-footer would really do a better job.
Considering Kerr won’t play the bigs he has now, probably true.
White and Prichard aren’t 6’6” either bro Prichard is definitely undersized. You’re right tho the Celtics don’t play undersized but they damn sure could shoot that 3 ball they had 4 or 5 players at 40% from 3 in 2024
The way you talk about basketball makes it pretty easy to tell that you have never played and most likely learned everything you know, including the terminology, from video games and highlight clips.
Maybe he didn’t play but that doesn’t mean he can’t be a fan, learn, or post about it tf lol
Celtics won last night with small ball. Our two centers hardly played. Queta only played 6 minutes and Garza didn’t play at all.
No one is saying small ball never works. It works if the shooters shoot 16-38 from 3, it works then and only then, those same Celtics gave up 129 points on defense btw…that’s not winning you a playoffs series.
Problem is, it’s almost impossible for that to work on a team level. You aren’t making the Finals unless you shoot that literally every day. Sometimes that can happen, like if you have Tatum+Porzingis C’s, or Steph Curry AND other shooters who are just as good, but Steph aside, literally every shooter on GSW is ice cold this year so far and the West is too deep to keep throwing games away with this “go small and shoot 3’s” method. Like, how can you lose 3 games in a row with an on-fire Curry? I have never seen that before. Steph is peak prime era Curry right now, and we are losing. That is because of abysmal gameplanning and in-game coaching. Kerr refusing to leave the rotations out there until the lead is 20-30 points, he brings them out before the game is cooked and why? For what reason? To lose or handicap Curry. Logically, that is the only reason here. So annoying, sorry for venting lol
Kerr always plays GP2 at the 4 and 3, Richard, Podz and Moody at the 3, when none of those moves should ever happen. Like, in a nutshell, those should be labeled “no-go” to Steve and then watch the defense suddenly come back.
🏆🏆🏆🏆
Ok dude
Not a good sign. At his age it can affect him constantly. Get well Al.
Buddy Hield <> Brook Lopez ……
Then you move Kuminga for ball handlers playmakers.
I would do that trade in a minute but Clippers will not.
Holy moly I wanted Brook Lopez on the Dubs this year SO bad, I definitely posted about it on here…lol…that trade would be hilarious if it happened, instant flawless victory for MDJ if it goes down…might actually win them a chip with this move alone tbh, GSW are not THAT far off, they just need a big or two at the expense of one of the undersized guards, and Buddy is one of those. I’m poppin bottles if this trade happens…
Here are the lists of players Kerr should be using at each position, in order
GSW 1:
Curry
Melton
Richard (yes, please start playing him at point, lets see it next to Podz)
Podizemski
Spencer (he is actually very bad despite having some lucky offensive games, GSW can get a better guy at PG on a 2W)
GSW 2:
Moody
Butler
Richard
Podziemski
Payton II
GSW 3:
Butler
Kuminga
Green
Santos
GSW 4
Green
Kuminga
Jackson-Davis
Post
Santos
GSW 5
Post
Horford
Jackson-Davis
Green
If Kerr can merely use these very-obvious lists as a guide, GSW will rarely lose again.
So Kerr should be playing Melton, who isn’t ready to play?
Butler backs up Moody at SG? How does that work if he’s the starting SF?
Kuminga’s injured, but he doesn’t start if healthy?
Post should start every game to give him experience. Horford’s injured, so TJD needs to back him up.
I have muted @Giants47 so everyone knows if he replies to me I will never see it, ergo he is a coward.
Most annoying reply guy on here? Giants47 is top 5, easily. Get a life, lil bro…
Muting is weak.
Obsessively replying to a person with nonstop negativity, even resorting to lies, is 100000x more “weak”. Sorry, disagree.
LMAO!!!
davey j complaining about people being negative here! This coming from someone who constantly goes on and on and on and on ripping into Kerr, GP2, Hield, etc. and anyone here who DISAGREES with him! Your constant anti-Kerr rants border on some kind of mental health condition. Yet, somehow thinks he know all and “knows ball” more than just about everyone else who’s here. Btw, also keeps bringing up Wiseman as a solution. lol
That’s what we call selective memory and projection!!
One of the few things we do agree on, Lopez would have been a good signing for GSW.
Criticizing players is fine, they are millionaires, going in on posters on here for no reason is as weak as it comes. We should be supporting each other’s ideas and expanding on them, not lying to try and win points amongst idiot haters on here via the pathetic and useless thumbs up function.
Look, if giants47 is stalking me in front of yall and yall are thinking its fine – you are wrong, it’s not fine, its annoying and it sucks for everyone to read. Giants47 has never made a single point in his replies to me, its always “I’m trying to get points on Davey J via telling lies” – that’s worthless here, as he is lying, he isn’t even trying to have a healthy convo.
I hate talking about this, I just want to talk hoops and their rumors. I’m simply fed up with this lying, reply guy loser, for my own mental health you just have to mute someone, sorry if that makes you mad…maybe don’t be such an annoying loser on here? Whether its NFL or MLB: the Giants suck, this guy is proof.