By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

OAKLAND — Not much upstages LeBron James these days, but the Warriors managed it Thursday, announcing on their Web site that Monta Ellis will return Friday against the Cleveland Cavaliers.

After one moped accident, two surgeries, hundreds of hours of rehab, six practices and one critical meeting to discuss the six-year, $66 million contract that he placed in jeopardy, Ellis is set to step back onto the floor at Oracle Arena.

Warriors coach Don Nelson said on KNBR that Ellis will start Friday — presumably alongside Jamal Crawford — at the point and expects him to log somewhere between 20 and 30 minutes.

“I was very concerned that he would maybe never be the same player again, because it was a very severe ankle (injury) — he severed two tendons in his ankle, and they had to surgically repair them and put pins in them and a whole bunch of stuff — and I was thinking he may never be the same again, but I can assure you that he will be,” Nelson said. “I’m watching him in practice and he’s coming back way faster than I thought. . . . I think he’ll be the same Monta we’ve grown to love and enjoy watching.”

Ellis only began practicing in 5-on-5 drills nine days ago, but has long felt that his ankle was 100 percent physically and that it was merely a matter of getting into basketball shape. In a sign of his anxiousness, he famously yelled, “Let me play!” after dunking at the Warriors’ shootaround Wednesday morning.

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By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

OAKLAND — The Warriors’ own Mouth of the South has roared to life.

Monta Ellis didn’t just partake in his first 5-on-5 practice drills Tuesday. The pride of Jackson, Miss. took them over, cajoling teammates and yapping at foes in a surprisingly noisy session of mostly half-court work.

With Baron Davis gone and Stephen Jackson sidelined — and before even getting into a game this season — Ellis has taken up the mantle of being the vocal leader for the Warriors.

“The whole time . . . he didn’t stop talking,” said Jamal Crawford. “That country slang, he just kept going.”

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By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

The departure of assistant coach Sidney Moncrief — who took leave of the Warriors on Thursday so he could join the Beijing Ducks as a consultant — should prompt a second look at Golden State’s stats from the free-throw line, since Moncrief was in charge of raising them to seldom-reached heights this season.

Golden State is converting 76.0 percent of its foul shots through 37 games (823 of 1,083), a mark that, if it holds up, would be a 4.3 percent jump from last season and the team’s second-best free-throw figure in the last 11 years (the Warriors of 2002-03 knocked down 77.8 percent).

But a closer examination of the numbers shows the increase is due more to roster moves than anything else; adding Jamal Crawford (99-for-111, 89.2% this season, career 83.9%) and Corey Maggette (130-for-155, 83.9%, career 82.0%) while subtracting Baron Davis (318-for-424, 75.0% last season) and Mickael Pietrus (66-for-98, 67.3%) will provide a spike in any team’s success rate.

That’s not to say Moncrief did a poor job. Comparing the six players who have spent the last two seasons with the team, four of them have increased their FT% from 2007-08, although some of the sample sizes from last season are so small as to make the comparisons silly.

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By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

The frontline void for the Warriors is kind of like the U.S. school system: You can throw however much money and manpower you want at it, and it just doesn’t seem to make a whit of difference.

The latest attempt to stem this tide is Jermareo Davidson, who was originally selected 36th overall in the 2007 draft by the Warriors but was traded before the night was out to the Charlotte Bobcats, along with Jason Richardson, for Brandan Wright.

Davidson, brought in today on a 10-day contract, essentially replaces Richard Hendrix, who was cut loose on Dec. 18 when Monta Ellis had to be transferred back from the suspended list to the inactive squad. It’s a funny coincidence, since they played together at Alabama for two seasons and were the two leading scorers on the Tide’s 2006-07 team. Here are the stats from that season (and remember that Hendrix was a sophomore, while Davidson was a senior):

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By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

As the rift between the Warriors coach Don Nelson and rookie forward Anthony Randolph continues to widen unabated, with the teenager effectively serving an unofficial and open-ended suspension, it’s funny to think about who might have salvaged this relationship:

Chris Mullin.

Randolph was a Mullin pick; Nelson wanted Jason Thompson but came around eventually to Mullin’s way of thinking, which was to take a potential superstar if one was available at No. 14 — and Randolph fit that bill.

It stands to figure that Mullin would be the guy best equipped to keep Randolph’s emotions in check when he would get yanked by Nelson’s short leash. After all, Mullin was the guy who served as Monta Ellis’ biggest champion during a rookie season in which coach Mike Montgomery derided his talents and kept him mostly glued to the bench until Baron Davis shut it down in March.

But Mullin has been persona non grata for a while now, unseen at practice or even at shootarounds, where he used to be a constant presence. He’s been on the road scouting college games, which should give him some great insights (on the Warriors’ dime) when he goes to work for another NBA team next season, but that’s a whole other problem.

Much has been made of the shot Randolph delivered to fellow rookie forward Rob Kurz in practice last weekend; the obvious inference to be drawn from Stephen Jackson’s reaction is that Randolph deliberately nailed Kurz.

I don’t think he would have wanted to cause serious injury, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if Randolph, having reached the height of his frustration, lined up Kurz’s chin and clocked him as a stand-in for Nelson.

Nelson has been almost unremittingly critical of Randolph this season. The coach’s biggest compliment — that Randolph had passed Brandan Wright on the team’s depth chart way back in preseason — turned out to be totally false, just a motivational tool to light a fire under Wright.

On the other hand, Nelson has been effusive in his praise of Kurz from Day 1, all but pouting when Kurz was cut on Mullin’s order and then campaigning hard to get him back once Ellis was placed on the suspended list.

I’m not saying definitively that that’s what happened. But I can certainly see Kurz being the epitome of everything that’s going wrong for Randolph — at least in Randolph’s eyes — and Randolph snapping after three months…