Three New Warriors Join Team This Summer

My team lost the NBA Finals.  They made a good try, but by the end it became apparent that my oft-stated claim that Steph Curry and Klay Thompson could wipe out the NBA with a team of G-Leaguers proved inaccurate.  What I should have said was: Steph Curry and Klay Thompson could wipe out the NBA except for the Toronto Raptors with a team G-Leaguers, if Thompson got hurt and couldn't play in the last game.

So I must admit I was a bit concerned when the NBA draft rolled around just a few days after the Warriors' heroic exit.  The organization had been so focused on winning a championship, I wondered if the front office had even been preparing for the draft.  I needn't have worried, and for all of you who root for other teams, well, I pity you.

• 1st round:  Jordan Poole, 6-5, Michigan.  They say Jordan Poole's a pretty good shooter, which is like saying Lawrence Taylor generally got good containment on the sweep.  Jordan Poole is a raging fire-flinging shooting demon likes of which...nobody has seen the likes of which.  The Michigan trainers kept buckets of ice by the bench so he could keep his fingertips from bursting into flames.  Scouts say Poole is most similar to...Nick Young?...better check that.  The rumors that Poole doesn't play defense, like, at all, are scurrilous lies spread by envious teams that picked up sure-to-fail 'projects' from Japan and Iceland in the first round.  They already know that they whiffed on the steal of the draft, a guy who took 113 three point shots last year and made all of them.  But no, go on, tell me more about Goga Bitadze's upside.

Stick with me Commish, you'll go far

• 2nd round:  Eric Paschall, 6-9, Villanova. Paschall would have been picked higher but his availability was uncertain until moments before the draft because he had been seriously considering an offer to lead a team of Navy SEALS on a mission to destroy Iran's nuclear capability, which was cancelled at the last minute when Trump pivoted to a negotiated solution.  Scouts say Paschall is like Draymond Green, except, you know, physically gifted.  Paschall's "signature move" is his patented dunk-shot, to which he brings a special flair.

Nickname: MURDER

• 2nd round:  Alen Smailagić, ?, no known university.  Reported to be 6-9 when he signed with the Santa Cruz Warriors last year, the 18 year-old Serbian cypher - the youngest man to ever sign a G-League deal - has reported grown as much as two inches.  Where'd he go to school?  Unknown.  Can he shoot?  Pass?  Dribble?  Also unknown.  They say he tore up a couple of Serbian junior leagues before orchestrating an elaborate gold heist and resurfacing in the Bay Area. Rumors that he had played games in public for the Santa Cruz team have been counterdetailed by rumors that the player in Smailagić's jersey was a local high school kid, while the Warriors hid the real Alen Smailagić in a shack outside of Fresno.  On the other hand, maybe they should sign that kid, because I notice he can pass, dunk, run the floor, and shoot the three:

Anyway, if you're rooting for someone else next year, might as well give up now.  The Warriors have reloaded with nuclear weapons and everyone else is playing for second place.  You thought you had us, but you were wrong.  The Bay's Team is the Best Team, and those dreams of our demise are lost, like tears in rain, and this will be totally obvious when these Warriors rookies totally dominate Summer League, I bet.


* Deepest apologies to Garrison Keillor, whose "Three New Twins Join Club This Spring" first appeared in The New Yorker in 1988 and was republished in We Are Still Married - (link)