You’ve probably already heard Draymond Green say that Jonathan Kuminga is the “bonafide No. 2 option” now which is music to my ears, but there were a few other notable quotes from postgame Utah that didn’t make the rounds.
This is the “Season of Humility” and, ironically, all three of the main guys admitted something on the podium. It just so happened that Green would tell Kendra Andrews of ESPN that the inflection point of the season originated here:
Honestly, me getting suspended helped, in a weird way. Because number one, since I got suspended, JK is taking off and that has kind of set the stage for this team. Bonafide number two option on our team.
Note: Kenny Atkinson (standing in for Steve Kerr who, you’ve probably heard, was in Serbia along with five other Warriors staff members or basketball executives) disagreed with pinpointing a specific moment — as you would, if you believe like I do that results are a byproduct of the process:
As a coach you’d like to see it’s the accumulation, right? Of all the work we’ve put in since the off-season and then leading up to this. And we have younger guys, like I said pregame, that are starting to kind of break through that development ceiling, punch through it. You could argue that’s JK in particular that’s really helped us, that those guys are like, ‘Okay,’ now they’re helping us to contribute to winning.”
Stephen Curry, after revealing last week that the Warriors simplified the offense, peeled the onion even further:
…because we’ve been doing it a certain way for so long and there’s a lot of comfort in our patterns and rotations and all that type of stuff. When you get shocked a little bit, it’s how you respond. And so it did force us to have to try new things and get extremely uncomfortable at times and still not lose confidence in our ability to try to turn it around. We obviously haven’t done anything yet, but the new looks of putting the ball in JK’s hands, putting the ball in Wiggs’ hands, Klay to understand where his shots are going to come from, Trayce being able to be plugged in at times and give us a new burst, all that stuff is new. So it’s on us to keep having confidence and whatever it takes to win.
And finally, Klay Thompson took a long pause to think about what his bad habits are when he plays impatiently, then finally answered new SF Chronicle Warriors beatwriter Sam Gordon’s question rather abruptly:
Just being thirsty to shoot the ball.
And then this morning, Tim Kawakami of The Athletic had a great podcast with Joe Lacob, who himself ended the interview with a message to DubNation to say that everyone should be excited with the potential of this new identity of the Warriors:
Here are my notes from the podcast. I’ll transcribe it tomorrow unless TK does it:
• Lacob: “We had a deal that would’ve saved us $80 million (this year).” [Klay, Chris Paul and Kevon Looney happen to add up to nearby exactly $80 million, btw, but I’m just spitting wads.]
• More Lacob: “Plan 1A has us out of the tax… we don’t want to be a repeater… so prohibitive… might be able to bring players back at different numbers.”
• Lacob on Plan 1B: “If this team were to slide… you know we would have to make big changes… could go the other way… not be a lottery team ever.”
• Lacob being admittedly “effusive” on Brandin Podziemski: “He’s setting records that haven’t happened in 40 years.”
This should lead into a very interesting off-season, now that Kuminga has been anointed the No. 2 option — Draymond actually said it twice in his two postgame interviews from Salt Lake City (see below) — because I still think Dray and especially Klay can look a little old sometimes out there.
There was a five- or six-possession stretch in the first half of the Jazz game where both teams missed early transition opportunities and it resembled a pickup game, as Kerr might’ve said on the podium had he been there. Klay was stuck in third gear and needed a sub.
Thankfully, Golden State has a stable of youngsters it can now turn to. But Lacob told Kawakami that he ideally would like to get under the luxury tax line, not just the second apron, due to the repeater tax which is handcuffs them from a lot of things, so it’s gonna be really interesting to see what’s out there in the marketplace this summer. I might have to put together my first salary cap spreadsheet for that.
By the way, the behind-the-scenes video from Utah showed off the team’s speed and Curry’s command of managing the game and throwing daggers to close the opponent out. It was very reminiscent of the Brooklyn close-out, although that one was more of the two-point-field-goal version of “The Maestro” — eerily reminiscent of how Michael Jordan closed games, just with a controlled pace and extraordinary halfcourt dissection:
LAC-GSW PREGAME NOTES
• Kawhi Leonard has a left adductor strain and is out vs. Warriors on Wednesday. (LAC PR)
• Amid three months of frustrations, PJ Tucker will be away from the Los Angeles Clippers to reset mindset and is expected to rejoin the team after the All-Star break, sources say. (Shams Charania)
• Development: The Clippers sent home two players – Bones Hyland and PJ Tucker – from road trip vs. Warriors tonight, sources say. Both are expected to rejoin the team after the All-Star break. (Shams Charania)
• Warriors guard Chris Paul, who has missed the last 16 games after suffering a second metacarpal fracture of his left hand on January 5 vs. Detroit and subsequently underwent surgery on January 8, was recently re-evaluated. The re-evaluation indicated that Paul is making good progress. He will intensify his on-court activities after the All-Star break, including parts of practice, and will be re-evaluated again in 10 days. (GSW PR)
• Clippers will start James Harden, Terance Mann, Paul George, Amir Coffey, Ivica Zubac at Golden State. (Law Murray)
• Clippers coach Tyronn Lue says Kawhi Leonard’s adductor injury isn’t serious but he is uncertain if he will play in Sunday’s All-Star Game after missing tonight’s game against Golden State. (Marc Spears)
VIDEOS & TRANSCRIPTS
0:00 Kenny, this is probably cliche at this point a little bit with Draymond, but if you look at — we haven’t been with you every day — so if you look at the stretch when he was gone, I think you’re 28th defensively and since he’s been back you’re 4th defensively. Like, is it really one guy that just changes everything in that way?
KENNY ATKINSON PREGAME GSW-UTA: “Yes.”
And then how does he do it?
“It’s not only his play, it’s his influence on other people on the court. And he has an incredible impact on his teammates. So coaching him on the floor, putting him in the right positions. And then he just cleans up all of our mistakes. And we make a fair amount of them. So he is just — it’s amazing. Lawrence Taylor? I don’t know, like great linebackers and he’s just that linebacker that sees everything and cleans everything up. I just continue, like I think offensively, he’s really helped us. We’ve been really good offensively but his screening ability, his corporate knowledge of the offense, he’s just been phenomenal for us since he’s been back.”
1:21 How different is today for you with dealing, obviously, with the head coaching duties?
“Yeah it’s not, obviously, not the ideal situation in a lot of senses. And then obviously from a personal standpoint, adding on that we’re here in Utah where Deki (Milojevic) had the incident and so it’s tough, but this is what we do in our jobs as professionals. We’ve got to move forward, but also remembering — and we talked about it a little this morning with the players — there’s no like, ‘Forget it, let’s move on.’ It’s like, ‘No, let’s remember. But we have a job to do tonight.’”
2:13 How has the winning helped?
“So the team was upbeat this morning. When you’re starting to go on a little bit of a win streak, you want more. So there’s that enthusiasm and we also know we’re behind the eight ball a little bit. So there’s an edge to us I think. But a positive edge because we’re winning some games now.”
2:42 Where is Lauri (Markkanen) more dangerous now than in the past?
“Oh yeah, a lot more. He’s really grown as a player. Shifted to the number one guy which I think there were some doubts in this league whether he could be that guy, but it’s obvious. He’s there. He’s arrived. We’d better get to his body. better make him uncomfortable. We gotta be physical with him. But he’s such a complete player. And to be seven foot — we were talking this morning about comparisons, Dirks of the world, Dirk Nowitzki. This guy has really turned the corner to be a star in this league.”
3:32 Where’s Podziemski impressed you most, just as a rookie?
“Ooh that’s a good question. I think defensively, first of all, just his instincts and his feel for the game defensively, and then his ball-handling, watching him in summer league there was a little concern. Can he play pick and roll? Can he handle the ball? And obviously Steve and the staff, we feel super-comfortable with him with the ball in his hands and really helps Steph a lot to have that secondary ball-handler. Then when you have Draymond out there, you’ve got three ball-handlers, so it takes a lot of pressure off of Steph, so yeah defensively and then the ball-handling part of it has been really really positive.”
4:29 You haven’t been here for the whole thing, but can you make a progression, maybe in a general sense, from a 19-year-old to a Kuminga? The Jazz have three 19-year-olds. What is this progress, and maybe go back to your Brooklyn days, that a 19-year-old goes through, to kind of get ready in this league, three or four years later?
“Yeah I have this theory, it’s a three-year kind of process and Year Two-and-a-Half, you really start to start to feel it and start to get really comfortable. And all the work he’s (Kuminga) put in, pounding the rock, it’s paying off. But besides maybe the LeBrons, I don’t know who else can we put in that category? Just right off the bat they were great. Most guys think it’s two-and-a-half, three years. It seems like that’s the average. So he’s feeling it and he’s got tremendous confidence now. And Steve’s got great confidence in him too. So it’s really a nice balance with that first group.”
5:45 Could you elaborate a little bit kind of on the sentiment that you shared with the team this morning? You don’t have to tell me exactly what you said, but just the reasoning behind it? Usually you hear, ‘We’ve got a game to play, so put things to the side.’
“No, we didn’t have a long talk about it. But we mentioned where Steve and the six people from our organization are, what’s going on over there, what’s happening, just keep them open to the communication of what Steve and the group are doing over there, and what they were with their family and how beautiful the service was. And I think you gotta talk about it. And I just wanted to communicate that to them and like I said, it wasn’t a huge discussion but I’m glad we addressed it.”
6:44 Have you talked to Steve today?
“Yeah, talked to him this morning. Obviously, long flight and all that and we talked about his experience over there; so far, I’ll kind of keep that to myself, the particulars and we talked about game stuff, in-game stuff, what we’re going to do, strategy-wise and rotation-wise, so good conversation.”
7:17 How do your duties kind of shift tonight?
“Well, I was thinking this is my first time as an interim replacement. I don’t know what you call it so it’s a little strange. I think I lean on our players who have this. It’s like that’s first and foremost, lean on those guys Steph and Klay and Draymond. So we got that. So there’s a comfort level there. Then most of the staff has been here longer than I have, 10 years some of them. And so lean on them because they know the system even better than me. And then I gotta lean on my experience, right? Obviously my head coaching experience in this league. So it’s kind of a combination of that, then you just gotta let it flow and let the game happen.”
8:07 Just your read on the team, how are they handling being back here?
“Yeah, we tried to keep to our routine, right? Like besides talking a little bit about what Steve and the group, their experience over there. But I think we keep them on their routine, focus on the task at hand. But like I said before, we’re in a better place. We’re obviously winning some games. We’re feeling the momentum starting to really kind of take off. So that helped, maybe today in a losing situation could be a little harder to deal with.”
8:58 Gotta get Draymond to put the headset on and we’re up top here. Draymond can you hear us? Hey Draymond. Hey it’s great to have you on post game. I just saw you. I’m gonna start with this. Give me your favorite memories of Otto Porter in the 2022 season.
DRAYMOND GREEN ON-COURT RADIO: “Winning the championship with him. Otto was huge to run. When we went with the lineup to space the floor, Otto was the guy we turned to in the starting lineup. And he was great defensively for us. He was great offensively. So he’s one of our brothers, one of our champions with us. We love Otto.”
9:48 What does it say about you guys that tonight Steph started; he was cold until the fourth quarter. You had some foul issues yourself but still this team had basically a double-digit lead most of the night. What does that say about the way you guys are playing?
“Well, this team is really growing together and it’s not based off one or two guys. Like you said I got in foul trouble. Loon was ready to go, Dario came in and gave good minutes Trayce stayed ready and gave great minutes and then Klay was good; to see Klay get it going and the young fella JK. What they’re bringing for us on the wings is absolutely incredible. JK is putting that pressure on the rim. He’s the number two option on this team. And the way he’s playing with Steph struggling, he gets to the free throw line, he gets to the rim and he keeps us afloat.”
10:20 Eight players in double-figures today which again talks about your depth. When you’re on a team like this and you know you’ve got a lot of options and you’re facilitating on the offensive end, what kind of reads are you looking for?
“Just trying to find the first open man. Obviously we always want to get the ball to Steph first and foremost, looking for Klay, looking for JK, looking for Wiggs, but we just always say hit the open man and let the next guy make the play. It don’t always have to be you making the play. And that’s what we’ve been living by and we’re doing a good job of it now.”
10:50 And again talking about some of the young guys, we get back a veteran recently, Gary Payton II. And obviously he’s just so versatile and so he’s such a different player there’s nobody like him in the league.
“Me and Loon always joke about GP being a small-ball five. The spacing that he finds on the offensive end is absolutely incredible. He’s an incredible dunker presence. He’s knocking his threes down, rebounds the basketball and obviously we all know he’s a hell of a defender. It’s great to see G back and bringing that guy next to me (Chris Paul). We got him coming back soon and we’ll be at a full squad. So it’s great.”
11:27 It was kind of an emotional day coming back to Salt Lake, but you guys are pros. You had 12 points, 8 assists, 9 rebounds tonight, 5-of-7 shooting, knocked down a couple of threes tonight early in the game.
“I airballed one too, how embarrassing.”
That’s okay. Keep shooting them.
11:47 So we’ve asked you a lot about your frustrations not closing and you haven’t closed, the ups and downs of how you’ve played this season, but how are you handling the ups and downs of how you’ve played this season?
KLAY THOMPSON POSTGAME PODIUM (VIDEO UNAVAILABLE): “I feel like I’m handling it good and I understand that it will be ups and downs. You want to be as consistent as possible but at least I’m out there playing. I’m healthy and I have fun and that’s what’s most important.”
12:26 Looking back at the past couple weeks, is there something tangible or something you can point to that kind of illustrates just what has led you guys to get a little bit of a streak and build some momentum in this change?
“Just everyone stepping up and filling in for when guys have an off night. Obviously Draymond being back helps so much. But just guys understanding the offense and the flows of the game. Like, we played everybody tonight and that’s a great sign of a well-balanced attack and a much-needed victory.”
13:05 What was it like for you today picking your spots finding openings?
“Wow, that’s a good question, actually. I think when I get cuts to the rim and I stay patient from the three-point line, I try to take open looks from three. But when you get early looks at the rim and you get a couple mid-range jumpers, everything opens up and I think that’s what allowed me to have an efficient night from the field.”
13:30 What keeps you from being patient when you’re not patient?
“Just being thirsty to shoot the ball.”
13:48 Draymond was rattling off a bunch of stats of Steph, just in the locker room, just averaging like five three-pointers a game, however many times in his career, and Kenny was just saying how Steph has this knack to just know when you guys need him to pull you through a difficult stretch or just keep you guys afloat. What have you seen from Steph really, this entire season, what he’s been doing for you guys?
“Just being Steph Curry and doing the other-worldly things like pulling up from 30 feet, making crazy layups, easy double-double night, 25-and-10. Three steals too. Don’t overlook that. And just being one of the greatest to ever play and just awesome to be by his side.”
14:37 When you get the sense of when the team really needs you — we’ve been talking to other people so far post game and they said, ‘Steph just has a sense of when he’s needed.’ Do you sense that?
STEPHEN CURRY POSTGAME PODIUM (video not available): “The flow of the game tells you a little bit of what’s necessary. Every game is different, obviously, but the ability to understand how the defense is guarding you and what’s available, so that you can make the game as easy as possible over the course of my minutes out there. Whether that’s being ultra-aggressive in the fourth quarter when you need some buckets or whether in the meat of the game, it’s allowing pressure to open up other options for my teammates and there’s a lot of trust that’s built-in there. And then if you hit a couple shots they know I’m probably going to keep shooting. So it kind of works both ways, but it’s just a feel thing. That’s the ultimate confidence of what I can do and what my teammates allow me to do.”
15:45 Draymond on the trip, he actually thinks that his suspension helped with some of the confusion of lineups. He’s really getting JK going, making your offense a little bit different than how it’s been in years past. And then now it’s just a plug-and-play. Do you agree with that, that it’s helped open up a different side of what you guys can do?
“Out of necessity, you had to have guys step up, be put in positions that weren’t predictable going into the season. So again, we talked about it a little bit. It’s because we’ve been doing it a certain way for so long and there’s a lot of comfort in our patterns and rotations and all that type of stuff. When you get shocked a little bit, it’s how you respond. And so it did force us to have to try new things and get extremely uncomfortable at times and still not lose confidence in our ability to try to turn it around. We obviously haven’t done anything yet, but the new looks of putting the ball in JK’s hands, putting the ball in Wiggs’ hands, Klay to understand where his shots are going to come from, Trayce being able to be plugged in at times and give us a new burst, all that stuff is new. So it’s on us to keep having confidence and whatever it takes to win.”
17:14 Eight twos from Klay tonight. How much do you like when you have that offense?
“It’s always just taking what the defense gives you. For him, some nights it’s tough because you don’t — he’s still Klay Thompson. He’s still gonna be guarded like he’s Klay Thompson and they’re gonna try to keep a body on him. But he opens up so much stuff for other people. So his looks might not be as consistent, then some nights like tonight where the ball is finding him and he’s making the right play, over and over again, shots start to fall and it’s always nice to see him smile that way because he knows he’s still impactful. So the way that we win is, everybody contributing and there’s not a consistent pattern on a night-to-night basis of who’s going to get what shots, it’s just let the ball figure it out and we all have to trust each other.”
18:12 He’s obviously had some frustrating nights when he wasn’t closing and he’s gone through some ups and downs, Klay, this year. How do you think from your perspective for a while he’s been handling the ups and downs, or mentally evolved based on what he’s been going through?
“For him to be able to show up tonight like he did speaks on his confidence in himself. Speaks to his competitive nature. I think he would say it’s not been easy the whole year but life isn’t easy. Your work isn’t easy and you gotta take the highs with the lows and whatever peace of mind you can find to just enjoy basketball, that’s usually where he thrives the most. So that’s what we’re encouraging him to do. That’s what he’s telling himself and it’s a long season. You just gotta stick with it.”
19:13 How weird was it today with no Steve, no (Chris) DeMarco, no (Ron) Adams?
“We knew this trip was gonna be tough, all the way around. Just the emotions of what Deki (Milojevic) meant to us, coming back to the place where it happened. But it was definitely weird without Steve and CD, Rick (Celebrini). It also helped us to acknowledge and celebrate what they were doing and where they were at and where they should have been. And then our ability to go out and allow the game to honor Deki. And I think it helped to be a little uncomfortable coming in with Kenny’s voice in the huddles and all that. Everybody had to continue to communicate, hitting the whole staff and everybody stepping up into a some different roles. It was fun. It’s kind of like in a different way, what I think was in 2019 when we played Phoenix one game and Coach let us coach. It was like that kind of vibe. So it’s an 82-game season. It’s nice to have a little out-of-body experience on that one.”
20:30 You guys win the boards again tonight. I know one of the top teams in the league in rebounding rate with Draymond at center. What’s the key to a smaller team being able to score on the Jazz the way you guys have been able to?
“Mindfulness on hitting first. Knowing you’re not going to meet anybody at the rim. You’re not going to out-jump anybody. It’s as old-school principle as possible. Hit your guy. Do your work early so that you can make it easy on yourself. And I think we’ve been a lot more mindful of that as of late. Draymond helps because he’s great at positional rebounding and doing that. But there’s obviously big tall trees down there that you have to have guards come back and help. And we’ve had times where we’re just all staring at the ball. And then everybody’s rushing behind us. And that’s where their athleticism can take over. But if we hit first and get the rebounds, 1) that controls possessions, but 2) we’re fast on the way back down. So you can get a lot of transition opportunities, crazy things. We missed a lot of layups. We probably could have had a whole lot more off of those. So it was a good effort.”
0:00 Klay made like eight twos tonight. He’s kind of scored in various ways. What did you like about the way he played and how he scored?
KENNY ATKINSON POSTGAME GSW-UTA: “Just really good composure, took his time, wasn’t rushed. We obviously have guys that screened for him and found him whether it’s in transition, in the half court. But he really used his size to get in the lane and shoot over there. They’re smaller guards.”
0:31 We ask Steve this a lot. But what do you think about how Klay sort of balances maybe the wear and tear on his legs or the minutes he has on his legs and sort of finding his spots better?
“Yeah, we we try to help him as a performance staff, us realizing what type of minutes he plays where we are in the schedule. We do that with all of our guys but definitely it’s a topic of discussion. But he had his legs tonight. He was phenomenal on both ends. I thought his physicality and shot challenges and he took Markkanen at the end. He said, ‘I want Markkanen,’ and did a really good job on him. So that great offensive game but I thought it was one of his better defensive games of the year.”
1:30 What did you like about your team defense tonight, forcing 17 turnovers?
“Physicality. I thought we made it really tough on Markkanen to get to the spots when he did get it. We crowded him. We didn’t give him any airspace. When he drove, we showed our hands and didn’t put him on the line. But our ball pressure and physicality was really good.”
1:55 Back over .500 tonight, the first time since November. How does that feel?
“It feels good; you know how it is in this league. You feel like you’re in the abyss. You’re just like, ‘Holy — this league’s so hard. There’s so many good teams.’ I know our schedule’s been tough and in the second half of the season it eases up a little; there’s no guarantees. But we’re in a good space 1 through 17. You kind of have no problem throwing in Trayce or if JK’s not doing great, you got Gary. And Steve has said it all year. We’re a deep team. We’re healthier and we kind of feel comfortable throwing Lester, Gui, all those guys. It’s a real credit to our depth.”
2:52 How different was today with with coach gone? So many of the staff gone.
“Yeah it’s like yeah strange. Steve’s our leader, leads the staff. He did a phenomenal job leading us through a really tough time. And I didn’t say that pregame, but our support from the organization, Mike and Kirk and all those guys, giving us the support we needed to get through this tough time and then Steve, he’s the best, great at communicating; he’s got great empathy. He’s got a lot on his plate but I thought he did a phenomenal job leading us through this and then our staff — funny, I feel like as a staff — I don’t know what the players — but we got closer through this. And that’s not the way you want to become closer, obviously. But we became closer as a staff, even more together than before.”
3:55 Following up to what you’re saying to Sam just about the depth, really being able to flex right now. Is there anything tangible over the past couple of weeks that you can point to and say that’s when everything really did start to come together, 1 through 17?
“Yeah I’ve asked myself that question. Like, when was the spark? When did it happen? I don’t have an inflection point, it happened at this time. As a coach you’d like to see it’s the accumulation, right? Of all the work we’ve put in since the off-season and then leading up to this. And we have younger guys, like I said pregame, that are starting to kind of break through that development ceiling, punch through it. You could argue that’s JK in particular that’s really helped us, that those guys are like, ‘Okay,’ now they’re helping us to contribute to winning.”
5:00 Steph’s hitting like seven threes a game over the last like twelve. You’ve been with him for a while now, but is this one of those stretches from him?
“Yeah he’s on fire. And he knows the moment, too, right? He knows we need him. Like I said before the game, we’re behind eight ball, we got a lot of catching up to do. And he just senses the mandate. The team really needs me. Three months in that same bucket like they just kind of know. I haven’t been here as long as some of the staff, but there’s just this feeling, ‘Okay, it’s time to go now.’ And there’s nothing more comforting than that as a coach, to have guys like that, that know when it’s time to turn it on.”
5:56 Two young guys you used tonight kind of sporadically, Moses and Trayce, just where are you at with them and where they kind of are in their time?
“Yeah, Trayce gave us a big boost. It’s important. We surround those guys with our vets. You make sure our lineups are right. Trayce was out there with Draymond which helps, helps him get in places where he needs to be. And Moses is in that kind of spot right now. He’s out with an injury. Now he’s coming back. Now he’s got to kind of find his way. So it was good. We got him some minutes. He did some good things out there. But I thought Trayce was really good, really gave us a boost of energy.”
6:40 Markkanen was pretty uncomfortable right from the get go. What were you guys doing to get him off his spots and get him uncomfortable?
DRAYMOND GREEN: “You just want to make guys like that take tough shots. He’s a great scorer. He’s been since he’s gotten here to Utah; he’s been a totally different player. And he’s continued that this year. Thought Wiggins did a great job on him to start, brought a good level of physicality to the game and it kind of set the tone for the whole team, or whenever you got switched on to him or anything like that, it just set a tone for us.”
Klay has been kind of a continued storyline lately. He had 26 tonight, 8 twos, kind of played a complete game. What did you think of how he looked tonight and then just generally? Where is that?
“I thought he looked really good tonight. He looked composed. He was not forcing anything. He looked like he was just at peace. I saw some quotes from earlier today where he was talking about Reggie Miller and Ray Allen. I don’t even know if it was a real quote. It felt like it was a real quote. But that’s great, like you see young guys taking these next steps that they taking, JK, BP is like — Yeah. You got to allow that growth and you got to be okay with that growth and Klay, he’s growing into that. That’s it. That’s an interesting position to be in and so to see him settling in, it’s big for this team. We need Klay. We need a very good Klay which will allow us to make a run. So it was great to see him get settled in tonight and take advantage of the lineups that was out there with him and got some easy shots and then once once he saw a couple go in, the rest is history.”
8:31 You’ve known Klay for a while. What’s it been like for you, watching him sort of go through his multiple slumps this year and sort of embrace what you mentioned, his future.
“That’s a brother. It’s my brother, so you never want to see anyone struggle. You never want to see anyone get crushed by the media, crushed by the public. That’s a tough thing to do, you know? And so but yet he’s resilient, always have been. So I don’t worry about Klay. Yeah. Because he’s tough as nails, so just got to support him. That’s where our job is, to make sure we’re supporting him at all times and that he know regardless of what’s going on outside of this locker room, the guys in this locker room have your back. That’s very important for us and important for him.”
9:26 Another game you guys won on the glass. You’re in the top three in the NBA in rebounding rate since you’ve started starting at center. What are the keys against bigger teams to control the glass like you guys have been?
“Oh it starts with your defense. If you’re not letting guys penetrate in gaps and get to the hole, then it keeps your shell intact which allows you to better rebound and position. And we’ve been doing a lot better job defensively of just keeping the ball in front of us. And when we keep the ball in front of us, that allows you to rebound. And then it’s also a total team effort. You see all those guards coming back in and fighting for rebounds a lot. Early on we were leaking out. Our guards was leaking out. If I was at the top of the floor I was leaking out and not coming back and securing the ball. We understand that we have a ton of speed, especially in the lineups that we’re starting out. We have a ton of speed. And if we focus and secure the ball, we can still get out and run. We can still beat teams down the floor but it starts with securing the ball. And so it’s been a point of emphasis for us. And we’re doing a pretty good job.”
10:34 For so much of the early season it was a struggle to find just a single five-man lineup that could go out on the court and hold their own, really, and Kenny was just in here saying now it’s 1 through 17 being able to contribute. What has just led to everything kind of smoothing out these past couple weeks for you guys?
“Honestly, me getting suspended helped, in a weird way. Because number one, since I got suspended, JK is taking off and that has kind of set the stage for this team. Bonafide number two option on our team. And so now you got different things, you’re able to figure out different things that we can go to. Our offense don’t look the exact same like it used to look. We got different things that we’re going to. You’re able to find different combinations that worked. And then it’s just been kind of plug-and-play since then, figuring the pieces out. So not that I wanted to get suspended or that it was good or anything like that, but I do think it kind of helped us find different things that we can go to and explore. And now you add me back into the fray, you add GP back from his injury, CP will be coming back, and now you got those pieces coming back that you know you can rely on, but it’s not just us, it’s everybody who’s stepping up, Lester, Gui. It’s everybody who’s going out there is playing good basketball. So that’s good for us.”
12:01 How weird was it today with no Steve (Kerr), no (Chris) DeMarco, no (Ron) Adams. And then obviously you knowing where they were,
“Kenny mentioned it, but we didn’t talk about it. And I thought that was great. We’ve lived these emotions with Deki (Milojevic) and what happened and we knew coming back in here, it would be awkward and it would be tough. Outside of Kenny, earlier this morning the film kind of giving us an update on coach Rick (Celebrini), CD (Chris DeMarco), Mike (Dunleavy, Jr.) went, Zaza (Pachulia). Outside of him giving us an update on how they were doing, what they were doing, we didn’t say anything about it. And I thought that was wonderful because the moment you start talking about it, you start feeling all of those emotions again. So those emotions don’t go away. They’re still there. I thought it was good to kind of leave them in the back of mind as opposed to like we can’t not live with that. Like, that’s our guy. You deal with that pain every single day but you learn how to move forward and learning how to move forward, you place it somewhere in your mind where you can kind of compartmentalize, in a sense. And I thought we did a great job of leaving it there, not rolling ourselves up with more emotions than the ones that we already have to deal with on the daily basis.”
9:45 refs: David Guthrie (19th season), Pat Fraher (23rd), Dannica Mosher (2nd)
11:30 discourse on the 49ers: very toxic wow, even media (Tim Kawakami’s headline)
10m53 Q1 good swing swing swing, athletic jump pass Kuminga, but Steph miss 3
10m33 Q1 Klay TD pass after made basket
10m19 Q1 Klay good D on Sexton
9m57 Q1 Fraher calls Draymond for holding down Collins on a blocking foul, but technically didn’t he take the charge first? — send this one to Coach Nick of Bballbreakdown
9m35 Q1 JK gets beat on the cut by Markkanen
9m25 Q1 can’t stay in front of Collin
9m10 Q1 JK downhill on an inbound BLOB
8m51 Q1 Steph good boxout of Lauri
8m44 Q1 Klay to Wiggs from Steph, 94ft
8m29 Q1 Klay good physicality vs Collins
7m42 Q1 JK misses a smash
7m30 Q1 Klay brick, I think it’s fatigue
7m15 Q1 Dray 2nd foul on oreb by JC, on the FT GP2 comes in for JK in standard rotation
7m09 Q1 Dray bad lead pass, my bad
6m45 Q1 Fraher calls another one on Dray on the oreb (3rd)
30:30 I like the old NBA when in the playoffs they didn’t foul out impact players
6m00 Q1 Wiggs 3 via Steph triple team inside
5m30 Q1 Podziemski takes another charge 94ft vs Lauri
5m10 Q1 Steph bricks another brick (0/4)
4m48 Q1 BP teardrop banker with 7 on the shotclock
4m19 Q1 Loon tap dreb, Steph downhill, BP 3 in trans
3m41 Q1 GP2 oreb hustle leads to Steph 3 chaos
2m52 Q1 BP good hands
2m06 Q1 Klay loses the ball, didn’t cut on the DHO befrore that
1m30 Q1 THT blows by JK
1m00 Q1 BP pull up 3 in trans
0m15 Q1 Les good D but Dannica calls foul on after Clarkson shove, opposite of Dray’s 1st — supports my thesis of 3 refs not being on the same page
0m06 Q1 JK 1v4, should’ve pulled up
11m30? Q2 JK base spin dunk, fouled? no call
10m30? Q2 Klay looks so slow on D (also crazy tov by BP)
10m11 Q2 THT having his way with us, pull up
9m50 Q2 THT layup vs zone again
8m55 Q2 Klay loses the ball again, retrieves, Les shoots a 3 he can get any day
8m20 Q2 JK good attack bad pass
8m01 Q2 Klay oreb, then Steph huge step turn corner layup
7m35 Q2 Lauri cut past JK again
7m25 Q2 Klay early 3
6m50 Q2 Klay backdoor via Dario
57:30 Klay should just go look at Larry Bird tape
6m08 Q2 Klay swipes down on Lauri who misses layup, then uses all his turbo power on the 94ft miss lefty
5m50 Q2 Clarkson 3 after Klay heaving
5m34 Q2 JK again not a great attack — crazy pickup ball sequences, Steve must be in Serbia looking at this and just face palms
4m51 Q2 Dray tells Dannica he was hit in the face 3x (after JC just did)
4m10 Q2 George waltzes by Steph
3m38 Q2 GP2 dives! Wiggs misses the Euro layup
3m21 Q2 Wiggs high five Clarkson? Fouled, not challenged, Deki channels Kerr in Serbia to say, “Have some balls”
2m26 Q2 Mo forgets to set a pick for Steph
2m21 Q2 Steph so open wow
2m00 Q2 Collin huge step past BP ok
1m37 Q2 BP gets him back, assist at rim to Dray
1m02 Q2 Dray Steph P&R smart choice but Steph miss
0m37 Q2 BP aruges a call, Collin 3 the other way 4v4
0m06 Q2 Wiggs great D on Lauri, Dray hits line drive halfcourt at buzzer-beater
1:11:00 GP2 HALFTIME AUDIO: “They don’t get back on defense” (is the game plan)
1:12:30 ZERO SLOPE on the parabola!!!! Lmao, that had to be the UGLIEST buzzer-beater ever
1:14:45 Draymond has been absolute comedy:
1:18:00 Draymond wanted to challenge and Kerr said he didn’t have one
https://twitter.com/officialnbabuzz/status/1756741736972316759
— these are the Draymond antics we love to consume
11m45 Q3 Klay good via Dray low post
11m14 Q3 Klay 3 on designed double-pick action, went to Klay 2x to start
10m52 Q3 JK blocked by Kessler, momentum swing dang
10m27 Q3 Wiggs 94ft Euro miss
9m47 Q3 Klay huge brick wow ouch
9m15 Q3 Dray fouls Collin but Fraher again calls it well after the foul (and1 instead of floor)
8m41 Q3 Wiggs misses another layup 2v1 fb
8m19 Q3 Klay stays in front of Collin, tov to Wiggs, Dray layup
7m28 Q3 JK finally hit a layup
1:35:00 on mandatory timeouts at 6m58 each quarter: https://en.as.com/nba/how-many-timeouts-does-each-team-have-in-an-nba-game-n-2/#warriors
6m04 Q3 Lauri easy cut past Steph
5m28 Q3 BP creates late shot
4m42 Q3 Guthrie says Collin didn’t close out from a distance so not a landing spot flagrant which is not the spirit of the rule (he could’ve injured him)
3m51 Q3 GP2 bad inbound tov
3m31 Q3 Steph steals Collin though, but very risky pass to Les who’s fouled
2m59 Q3 Klay holds the ball too long, base move J good
2m45 Q3 JK risky fade got the foul call from Dannica
2m16 Q3 Les goes out of bounds on a curl
1m45 Q3 BP bad pass alley
1m30 Q3 TJD scores on a tough pass by Les fb
1m17 Q3 Les takes a charge on THT
1m05 Q3 Klay good pass although TJD screen was so slow
0m47 Q3 TJD tip in from impossible angle
0m05 Q3 Les steal and Klay layup with 0.1, Klay had fallen into cameras, cherry picks!
1:56:45 POLL RESULTS: Do you recall if Dray has made a 3 buzzer-beater from more than 35 feet?
Hell nah (66%)
Yes, it’s happened before (33%)
Poll complete: 68 votes
1:57:15 We’ve done good to take Lauri out the game — I don’t think they use him well, buncha kids running around like Romper Room
11m45 Q4 Dray swats Clarkson on help of JK
11m34 Q4 Les curl pick to Klay and1
10m28 Q4 Klay misses after fake, mad at himself
9m26 Q4 Klay one legger! after a curl screen by Dray
8m58 Q4 Klay curl line drive J
8m31 Q4 JK TTBTTOT
8m18 Q4 THT spins past JK
2:04:30 12 team tov, at least by now we are hitting 12 this late, kind of a new identity
7m50 Q4 Steph 3 (with interesting lineup: Steph, Mo, Wiggs, Dario, TJD)
7m21 Q4 Steph GOAT close 3
7m06 Q4 Steph steal and Mo had a bead on it
6m30 Q4 Steph TJD P&R roll, maybe TJD in for Dray with 4 pf
6m06 Q4 Mo good hustle inside timeout orebs
5m10 Q4 Guthrie gives TJD and1 on hook grab by Clarkson (another call of late action)
4m58 Q4 Dray good close on Lauri
2:14:30 Cholo: playing TJD allows Dray to guard Markannen — also JK is out, hasn’t played good D,
4m12 Q4 tic tac toe Steph Dray Wiggs (Klay gets to close!)
3m53 Q4 Lauri beats Klay backdoor again
3m38 Q4 Steph another dagger started 1/7 now is 6/14 (5/7 til now)
3m20 Q4 Steph TTBTTOT
3m00 Q4 Steph heat-check no good, says my bad
2m35 Q4 Steph another dagger
2m21 Q4 Klay dagger with permission from Steph
1m37 Q4 Dray comes over to pickup BP from floor after wanting a foul not called (TJD)
2:23:15 I’m a tad worried about Friday (we play the Jazz again in Utah) and we will hopefully play with more force and “urgency” and locked in or sharpness, Utah is the new Houston, it’s hard to take them seriously, Danny Ainge must love it, probably wants to tank seeing how “sloppy” this Jazz team is. Directive to Will Hardy: do NOT form an identity, do NOT utilize Lauri’s strengths
2:25:30 KLAY ON-COURT AUDIO: “I miss talking about sailing with (Deki)”
2:31:45 Havok: We have one of the easiest schedules left in the league right? — not really, it’s good team bad team good team bad team
2:34:45 on teams being afraid of us — nah, we’re not champ-caliber yet. What would make us champ-caliber: 2022 Finals Wiggs, Klay has to not be pissy, JK has to play well and dominate the downhill, adjust to the adjustments
2:37:15 Parth: our pace is much higher now last 10-12 games, with CP3 back how do you see our pace of the game ? — I have no idea! It’s still an identity-type thing and somehow valuable if we get into playoffs and things slow down but yeah for the regular season, I might be concerned about that pace
2:39:00 whatever happens when we hit the off-season, even if we win a championship, with our older guys, the NBA is just getting faster and more talented, idk if I can picture CP3 as a Warrior
2:43:00 KENNY ATKINSON POSTGAME AUDIO
2:48:15 BP will be in Rising Stars on Friday at 6pm (Team Pau with Wemby)
2:51:00 ANTHONY JOINS THE CHAT — he will be repping LGW at ASW Indianapolis
2:55:45 DRAYMOND POSTGAME AUDIO: “You never wanna see a brother get crushed by the media”
3:01:00 on if Klay was getting “crushed by the media” — gotta have inner happiness, not external validation, and NBA players just haven’t gotten that way of understanding information vs entertainment
3:18:00 Indianapolis coverage talk
4:00:00 (generally speaking) talked about Klay, guys getting older, Spurs dynasty and how they got to 2017 WCF swept by GSW
👍👍💛💙