By Geoff Lepper
48minutes.net

OAKLAND — The running joke about Warriors forward Al Harrington concerns his resemblance to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. This summer, however, he felt like a different green character of cartoon fame:

The Incredible Hulk.

“I had a lot of anger built up over different situations,” Harrington said. “And it’s hard to come to work that way.”

Instead of going the Bruce Banner route, Harrington took a page from the Dr. Phil handbook and confronted the source of his enmity: Namely, his boss, Golden State coach Don Nelson.

“We spoke this summer, very openly,” said Harrington, a 10-year NBA veteran who was clearly stung by the way his playing time yo-yoed last season. “I told him how I felt about everything, and he told me how he felt about everything. As men, we talked about it and squashed it. . . . It was definitely necessary.”

Almost as necessary as Harrington is to the Warriors’ plans. If Golden State is to salvage any chance of moving up in a stacked Western Conference field where 48 wins fell short of the playoffs last season, a large part of the push will have to come from Harrington, who averaged 13.6 points per game last season and shot only 43.4 percent from the floor, his second-lowest figure since his rookie season.

“I can’t see us having much of a chance to win unless he plays at a high level this year. So he’ll have every opportunity to do that,” said Nelson, who last season often switched up Harrington with now-departed Mickael Pietrus and Matt Barnes in an attempt to goose production at power forward. “I’m not as deep as I was a year ago, so if he has an off game or two, we’re going to play through it this year. I’m not going to beat around the bush: He’s going to have to be productive.”

So far, he has been. Harrington, who is on a quest to earn 35 solid minutes each game, has had arguably the best camp of any Warrior. It reached the point Friday where Nelson came out for his meeting with the media and launched into an unprompted soliloquy regarding Harrington.

“Mentally, he’s sharp,” Nelson said. “From opening day, he’s been ready to roll. . . . I’m really happy to see that he’s approaching the season the right way.”

Harrington hasn’t been a primary offensive option since he co-headlined two terrible Atlanta Hawks teams,…