The Warriors are better without Damian Jones

To explain the Warriors' much-improved performance against Milwaukee on Friday, it's easy to look at an obvious positive factor:

* The Dubs' stars passed the ball sooner when double-teamed, and Jerebko, McKinnie and Iguodala hit open shots (Jerebko and McKinnie were 1-for-11 from 3 in the first matchup)

BUT there was an obvious negative factor as well: Damian Jones wasn't around.

In the first game between the two teams, Jones played 23 minutes. He had a good game with 12 points, including several early open shots. He was only -5 in BPM while the big 3 stars (Green was out for both games) were all worse than -20.

But the team looks different without Jones: it looks better.

On offense, Jones still doesn't seem to fit in the flow. On Friday, the Warriors often used Looney on the perimeter as a safety valve to pass to. Looney isn't going to shoot from there, but he was good at redirecting the offensive flow.

On defense, the Bucks steamrolled the Warriors inside in the first matchup, but in the second, when the Warriors had ZERO traditional centers, the Warriors' defense was much better.

Jones' minutes went to Looney and Bell, and some to Jerebko and McKinnie. They are all better players than Jones at this stage of his career, even as Bell seems to still have plenty of learning to do as well. If you want to win a game, give the most minutes to your best players. Matchups can add complexity to it but the basic concept is simple and hard to refute. If you give more minutes than necessary for star-resting purposes to lesser players, you're hurting your chances.

It made sense for Kerr to give Jones a lot of minutes in essentially meaningless early-season games. Maybe Jones will eventually develop into a good player, although perhaps not for the Dubs. The Warriors finally taught Javale McGee to play, and now he's taking that to the next level in LA. If it takes Jones 5 or 6 years to figure it out, it probably won't happen in San Francisco.

For now, the Warriors shouldn't worry about whether or not Jones can come back for the playoffs. Even though he was technically a starter, if they are a better team without him on the floor -- and I think they are -- he's just a sub to eat minutes at the end of blowouts.