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…

Bill Ingram over at Hoopsworld had a blurb on his site last night regarding Monta Ellis that said in part, “we now have reports coming out that suggest the injury might cause Ellis to miss the entire season.”
Ingram did not cite any sources, so I’m not sure what reports he’s referring to. Three possible sources come to mind:

A) Web/print reports
B) Rumors coming from inside the Warriors’ organization
C) Talk from someone in Ellis’ camp

As for A) . . . I have not seen any reporting from Janny Hu, Marcus Thompson II or Matt Steinmetz — the other media members who cover the team on a daily basis — or anyone else, for that matter, that suggests Ellis is going to be out significantly beyond the mid-December target originally set forth by the team.

As for B) . . . I sent a copy of the Hoopsworld article to a team spokesman, requesting comment, but did not hear back before the team got on a plane back from China. However, no one I’ve spoken to from the team has brought up the idea of this being season-ending.

As for C) . . . well, that’s an intriguing thought; one potential way for Ellis to get back at the team for whacking him with a $3 million fine is by extending the timeframe he needs in order to be “fully recovered.” However, while I’m presuming Monta is not happy with the size of his fine, I don’t think there’s a realistic chance he would go to that kind of length to exact vengeance.

** While Ellis may not necessarily be in danger of missing the season, there is no doubt that the team is concerned about the possibility of him coming back too soon. The memories of Jason Richardson’s struggles to recover from arthroscopic knee surgery two years ago — a far simpler procedure than what Ellis has undergone — are still very fresh.

Richardson had his surgery at almost the same point in the preseason as Ellis — Aug. 22, compared to Monta’s Aug. 27 — and was originally expected to be back by the start of training camp. Then he was expected to miss only a couple of weeks of training camp. He wound up playing on Opening Night, but was a mere shadow of his former self for the first two months of the season — shooting 37.4 percent from the floor, 29.7 percent…