Kerr: “We have the answer here. Last year, we had to make a move”

[GSW-PHX practice videos/transcripts]

Steve Kerr after practice Wednesday, looking back to last year when the Warriors traded for Dennis Schroder:

Last year, I felt like we had to make a move. This year, I don’t think that’s the case. I think we have what we need here, but we need to develop more consistency in our play and that starts with me giving these guys more consistent roles, making sure we get Jimmy (Butler) the ball, making sure we get to that style of play a year ago where we had control of games, where we were taking great care of the ball and turning the other team more often than we were turning it over. And just feeling like we were in control night after night versus what we’ve seen lately, is kind of track meets, up and back, whoever makes a couple threes at the end of the game is gonna win. We’re not in control of games right now, but we have that ability and that’s our focus with looking for that consistency.

Not surprisingly, pace across the NBA is way up, as Kerr has said on the podium several times this year. But I noticed OKC was fifth in pace last season at exactly 100.0. This year, they are at nearly the same pace: 99.9.

That ranks 15th this season!

With Jonathan Kuminga suddenly declared by Steve as back in the rotation, I look forward to how the lineups mesh and how slowed down things might get with the concerted effort to get Jimmy the ball when one Wardell Stephen Curry is subbed out and resting.

Perhaps more importantly, can Draymond Green and Steph reduce their turnovers?

The above should also lead to better point-of-attack defense, but I’m still keeping my eye out for those Trey Murphy trade scenarios, which I’ll start to talk about some more as we approach January 15th.

This team needs a winning streak of four games or more so badly.

Kerr gave one of his better, more thorough interviews with 95.7 The Game on Tuesday. His radio hit included a lot about “rewarding” players, but also the flipside where if the team is losing, then he may need to “shuffle the deck,” which would be a way for Kuminga to get back in the rotation. Again, this was back on Tuesday.

It was still rather nebulous, JK’s situation. And then he revealed after practice Wednesday:

I can tell you JK has been great this last week as he’s been out of the rotation. He’s working really hard and I’m gonna reward that. He needs to be back out there and it’s tricky. I think we have 14, 15 guys who I feel very comfortable putting on the floor, but I also only feel comfortable playing 11 at the most each night, really 10.

You can see the transcription below. I’ll just put the Kerr interview from the latest practice (separate from the radio Q&A the day before) behind the paywall for a day or two.

In my “honest recap” of the game in Cleveland…

…I concluded that Kerr subbing Gui Santos in for the last four minutes was more because Santos was playing near or even above his usual ceiling — the spin move in the block against Craig Porter, Jr. was actually a bit eye-popping.

So I thought that was more the reason why JK didn’t play, not that JK had played bad, although in that game, he had gone 1-for-10 from the field (1-for-7 on two-pointers).

But he only had 1 turnover that night to go along with 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 1 block. The turnovers had improved from 3 the previous game and 7 combined over the previous three games.

So, I’ll be an apologist for Steve on trying to catch a hot streak in Portland after Cleveland and Chicago and therefore giving JK another DNP, but I was ready throw up my hands if another DNP was coming in Phoenix.

Was his issue with Kuminga personal?

Here’s Kerr’s entire response, as said to 95.7 The Game:

No, that couldn't be farther from the truth. We treat all of our players with the utmost dignity and respect and all we try to do is win. And I've talked about this publicly, I don't think it's a secret. It has been a tricky fit at times and he is a really talented player. And he's had some really good moments. And then there's been times where it hasn't clicked. The last couple of weeks, it was a tough fit and so we went in the opposite direction just to try to see if we could find a little more rhythm. And it's as simple as that.

A previous quote about the two having a conversation reinforces this, but I will say this: I think Steve is lucky that Jonathan — described to me as “calm” by his best friend, Gibou “EyeG” Njie — has a mom who is a pastor. I am willing to bet that 99% of young, talented, competitive ballers out there would have had a blow-up with the coach by now.

Anyways, JK had an evening workout session at Grand Canyon University, per EyeG:

Should be a fun game. I am going to wait a bit more before assessing if this team can have the four or five win streaks of four or more games to get to 50 wins at that 6th seed. Like Kerr described at practice, the identity of the team has been in flux.

All the more important that their vets stay healthy. Can’t get sick any more. Can’t have any more babies. Sounds mean, but the hall passes for the season have already been used up. That’s what happens when you’re old. And I think a lot of that is the responsibility of Steph and Dray, not Steve. Thankfully, Al Horford is apparently fully healed and it’s just a matter of ramping back up, conditioning-wise.

Here’s the video interview of Kerr after practice, transcript below the paywall, as mentioned:

Here’s the 95.7 transcript with the one from Wednesday’s practice below the paywall…

00:00 A lot of you have talked about the frustration of this moment and, especially with, for instance, that Joe Lacob email that I know you addressed today and said, no big deal. I’ll just give you my take. When you read that, it just sort of feels like there’s a lot going on with relationships and opinions and everything. So how would you answer the question looplof, as a group, how are y’all doing with this frustration?

00:29 STEVE KERR ON 95.7 THE GAME, 2 DAYS BEFORE GSW-PHX ADD: We’re doing fine. I mean, this is part of how this business works. There’s frustration and there’s all kinds of communication and it’s not that different from last year. I think we were below .500 fifty games in and everyone was frustrated then, too. So, you have to be able to navigate the ups and the downs and you only do that with stability in the organization and alignment. And we’ve had that for a long time. And obviously, the email that Joe sent was, you don’t really want stuff posted, like, private emails posted, so I understand it. Like, we all have emails that if they were exposed out there, it could open up some cans of worms and it’s just part of it. So I don’t worry about it too much.

01:27 Can we ask you to maybe put a little bit more definition, though, on the frustration? What if I asked you what specifically are you frustrated about? How would you answer that?

01:37 Well, I personally am frustrated that we’re losing all these close games and games that I felt like we should win. And, obviously, I’m the coach and so I’ve gotta do a better job of helping our guys close these games out, but we’re 5-9 in clutch games this year. I feel like we could very easily be 9-5 and if we were, then everybody would be fine. But we’re not and so when you lose close games and you’re not clicking, then there’s gonna be frustration. It’s professional sports. There’s a lot at stake and a lot of passion around all of this stuff, so this is the job right here, what we’re dealing with.

02:20 Does part of your personal frustration stem from not being able to really find a starting five or a core 10 or 11 players who can really play consistently, in guys you can bank on night to night?

02:35 Yeah, some of that has been unavoidable, just with the absences, guys in and out of the rotation. Some of it, I like to reward players who are playing well, so Pat Spencer gives us a couple of great games, I’m gonna start him. This is how I operate, but when you add it all up this season with the injuries, with the absences, some guys playing better than others, yeah, I’ve been juggling the roster, the starting lineup night in and night out. And I think we do have to try to gain some continuity and some consistency here, so hopefully I’m gonna start the same way I did in Portland. I’ll start Moses and Quinten Post in Phoenix and hopefully we can establish that as our starting lineup going forward. But you always have to adapt to whatever’s happening during the season.

03:32 I guess we should probably let our listeners know who are just joining us, kind of what Joe Laocb’s email said because I think there’s some interesting sentences in there that I’d love to get your perspective on his email read. “You can’t be as frustrated as me. I’m working on it. It’s complicated. Style of play, coaches desires regarding players, league trends. Jimmy is not the problem.” When he says “style of play and league trends”, I’d love your perspective on those two things. The main criticism, which is you guys are too small, is the style of play that you’ve been employing for a number of years. Has something happened around the league that has passed that by, in your opinion?

04:14 No, I think that where the league has changed is everybody now is playing fast. Everybody’s shooting threes. Portland went into that game the other night as the 30th ranked three-point shooting team in the league, dead last, and they went 21-for-40. This is how the game is played now. It’s played fast, everyone shoots and every night you’re vulnerable to a hot shooting night. The pace at which we played 10 years ago was the fastest in the league at that time. We’re now middle-of-the-pack. I can tell you, if you watch our team play 10 years ago, you watch our team play now, we’re playing very differently. We have adapted, as the league has adapted, but the roster has changed and you always have to adapt according to your own talent and your own players. And we do have a small team. It’s just the way it is, so as coaches, we try to do the best we can to maximize the roster, to help each guy be the best version of himself and win as many games as we can. And obviously every year is different and it’s a long year and I have a lot of confidence that we’re gonna get it going with this group.

05:36 Interesting. You mentioned that about pace. I was looking at the championship year from four years ago and you’re almost exactly where you were then, but so many more teams play fast and your team is older and your team is smaller. Is there a counter that you can make as a coach to try to help your team account for the fact that so many younger teams are playing faster?

05:58 Yes, there is a counter and that’s take care of the ball. You may have heard me say that once or twice.

06:05 Maybe once, yeah.

06:07 Sometimes this stuff isn’t really as complicated as everyone wants to make it out to be. When we take care of the ball, we win. When we don’t, we lose. I’ve been saying that every week on this show. I say it to the media. I say it to our players and that’s the bottom line. And when we take care of the ball, we get our defense set up. We control the game that allows Jimmy Butler to do his thing and that’s what this is gonna come down to. If we can consistently take care of the ball, I think we’re gonna be a really good team. We saw it a year ago after we got Jimmy. We went 23-8. We were in the Top Five in offense and defense. We rarely turned it over. We turned other teams over. It all clicked and that’s the same formula that we’re looking for now and I have to help our guys get there.

06:58 Dubs are on the road Thursday, but a lot of home games are coming. Phoenix will be here on Saturday, Orlando on Monday, obviously the Dallas Mavericks on Christmas Day. I’m glad the topic of Jimmy Butler just came up there, Steve, because you talked about this after the other game and I think the quote was something along the lines of, you don’t feel like you’ve done a good enough job sort of positioning Jimmy Butler. Let me ask it to you this way, in your eyes, why does Jimmy this year not quite look like Jimmy last year?

07:34 Well, I think the circumstances are different. When he came to us last year, there were only 30 games left. It’s kind of a sprint to the finish line. It’s a completely different deal when you go through the 82 games for players, for coaches, for the team. 82 is a long haul and we’re in the midst of that long haul. Right now we’re trying to find our team. We’re obviously mixing up lineups. We’ve had a lot of different groupings and so our team hasn’t found that groove yet, but I have no doubt that we will find it. I’ve gotta do a better job of making sure Jimmy touches the ball. Every time he gets the ball, we have a good possession, but there were some possessions the last couple games where he never touched the ball. And that’s on me and that’s on our team to figure that out together. I feel really strongly that when the game is played through Steph and Jimmy for 48 minutes, we are really good. That doesn’t mean they have to shoot every time. It just means they have to have the ball and threaten the defense and then everybody has to play off of those guys.

08:44 Is part of the struggle the non-Steph minutes when Jimmy’s out there and for you, the challenge of being able to put enough shooters around Jimmy to where he can isolate and do what he needs to do, but also if he’s being guarded heavily, you have somebody help him out?

09:01 Yeah. Well, again, I’m gonna keep going back to the last year. Those last 30 games, we really thrived when Steph was off the floor. We played Jimmy and Draymond, Quinten Post, and Brandin Podziemski either with Buddy or Moses. We found a really good groove and so we have all those guys. They’re all still on our team. We can still play that group together. We’ve got a few other combinations we can go to, but there are very fine margins between winning and losing in this league and right now we’re losing in the margins with the turnovers, with just some key plays here and there. And like I said, it’s up to us to figure this out, to make sure we button up and take care of these close games. And I know we’re capable of that.

09:54 Steve, I remember asking you last year if it was in general realistic to think a team could contend for a title when its core players are all over the age of 35. And you said yes and I’m looking at this year and now I’m wondering just about what’s on their plate as a core. Are you comfortable right now with what the amount that feels is sitting on the shoulders of Steph, Jimmy and Draymond, particularly with them in and out of the lineup?

10:27 I am. Yeah, because this is how our team is structured. They’re all still really damn good players, amazing players. And I had just watched it nine months ago. I watched us make a run in the playoffs and advance to the final eight and win Game 1. And if had we stayed healthy, I could’ve, I think, we could’ve gone pretty deep and made a run, so I know we can do it. And we’re obviously in a conference that’s loaded and there’s some great teams out there, but we still feel like we have a lot to give.

11:09 You mentioned before that you have a certain amount of meritocracy when it comes to playing time and it’s been great and Gui’s been in there because he’s earned it. Is Jonathan Kuminga at a spot where if somebody ahead of him regresses, can he be poised to get back into the rotation?

11:27 100% he can absolutely get back and I’ve talked to him about it. He’s had some really good practices this past week and the pendulum always swings, so I’m just encouraging Jonathan to stay ready for when his opportunity comes back.

11:45 So for right now, it’s more that the people in front of him, particularly Gui Santos, they’re still playing well enough to where that’s keeping him at bay as opposed to JK not doing the things that he should be doing.

11:59 Well, he hasn’t played the last three games and we had a really good road trip and the guys who I played ahead of him on the road played really well, so I’m rewarding them, but we’ve lost the last two games. So when you find something in this league, you really do need to stick with it because it’s fragile. Everything is very delicate in this league. The flip side is also true. If you’re losing, then you’ve gotta shuffle the deck and try something different.

12:33 Steve, this is a tough question to ask, but I’m gonna give it a whirl here because I’ve had two people I consider big-time Warrior fans come up to me just in the last handful of days and say that for whatever reason the Jonathan Kuminga and the Warriors organization thing to them feels personal. I would love to hear your response to that.

13:01 I’m not even sure what that means, but I guess it means that we are holding something personally.

13:08 Yeah, I think that was the implication, yeah.

13:13 Yeah, no, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. We treat all of our players with the utmost dignity and respect and all we try to do is win. And I’ve talked about this publicly, I don’t think it’s a secret. It has been a tricky fit at times and he is a really talented player. And he’s had some really good moments. And then there’s been times where it hasn’t clicked. The last couple of weeks, it was a tough fit and so we went in the opposite direction just to try to see if we could find a little more rhythm. And it’s as simple as that.

13:54 One more slightly tricky one, and this is a sense maybe from fans and callers and whatnot, but the idea of Joe Lacob and his input, how much goes into that, from whether it’s Joe Lacob or Mike Dunlevy or others when it comes to things like lineups and rotations? What’s that process like for you, as much as you can reveal the inner workings of what you do?

14:18 Joe has always been unbelievably respectful to me in my position as Coach. He’s always made it very clear that he’s never gonna intervene. He never comes into the locker room after a game, if, I mean, I’ve heard horror stories from my fellow coaches about owners barging into the locker room, yelling, being mad, that kind of stuff. Joe couldn’t be more respectful of my position. He’s never once told me you know who to play, who he thinks I should play. We have conversations. We probably talk once every few weeks or so and we get along great and he’s opinionated, but respectful and he’s a great owner. You think about where the Warriors were before Joe took over the team and what he has done since, that’s all you need to know. He’s a phenomenal owner. He’s incredibly passionate, so sometimes that passion spills out as it did with the email and I’m okay with that because he wants to win as badly or even more than everybody else.

15:26 I wonder sometimes about those kind of dynamics within any company. I mean, hell, in our kind of business, we have it all the time where people, they spar a little bit over stuff and then you go do your job and you go to bed and you wake up and do it the next day. How would you kind of describe those interactions from the high-level front office staff?

15:51 Well, Mike (Dunleavy, Jr.) and I talk every day, sometimes twice a day. He’s become a great partner, great friend. He’s been a great partner since Day One, phenomenal at his job, putting together the roster that he has, the Draft picks over his time here, but more than anything, just constant support and challenge at the same time. He supports me, but we have such a good rapport and friendship that he gives me his thoughts. I give him mine. We can spill our guts to each other and in the end, we just forge ahead and try to help make the team the best team we can. And he helps a lot in the communication with players, just like Bob Myers did. And I look at coaching this team as really a collaboration with Mike, with Steph, with Dray and with Joe, even, despite the fact that Joe is not involved in the day-to-day. We have had great alignment here and an amazing, stable organization. And I don’t think that’s any different now. It’s just that an email got out there that was reposted and, like I said, I know I wouldn’t want all my emails exposed out there. I’m sure you guys have yours, too, so this is all part of life.

17:22 So yeah, Mark and I were joking that we’d be so fired weeks ago, months ago if that happened. Matt Steinmetz has a question for you, if you are willing to accept that from Steiny.

17:33 Sure, yeah.

17:34 He’s curious about the contract and you’ve been in this situation before, and he acknowledges that times have changed. And he was wondering, is there any negative as far as team building when your future with the team is uncertain?

17:50 No. No, not the slightest. I don’t think the players have any concern about that, so yeah, that’s a simple answer. No.

18:03 Take that, Steinmetz. Yeah, the last one was better.

18:07 That was a stupid question, Steiny. Stupid. Terrible.

18:12 Hey, Will Richard, people are excited about him and he’s kind of ended up out of the rotation right now, so what are your plans for him?

18:24 Well, you just can’t play more than 10 or 11 and we’re getting healthy, not completely healthy, but we’re almost there. And so it’s been tough not playing him because I’m a huge fan and a believer and he offers us stability and decision-making, good shooting. So he’s just gotta stay with it right now. He’s, frankly, he’s sitting because he’s a rookie and I’m honoring what the older guys have done over the years. I think that’s good for chemistry. I think this is kind of how it goes. You have to-- guys have to earn their stripes and you give everybody a fair look and then you continue on through the season, so he could very easily find himself back in the rotation. He’s obviously a good enough player, but there are times where you just, you can only play 10 or 11. Three or four guys are out of the loop right now. It’s Jonathan, it’s Will. Gary Payton’s barely played the last couple games, so we could have this conversation every week. It would just be three or four different guys that we’re talking about.

19:39 And I know Pat Spencer won’t play Thursday, personal reasons. I won’t ask you to reveal what those are, but is there a sense that he could be back on Saturday or would this maybe potentially be a longer absence?

19:51 No, the hope and the expectation really is that he’ll be back Saturday.

19:56 Hey, anything that sort of hits you about the whole home-and-home thing? You get to see Dillon Brooks twice this week.

20:05 Yeah, I mean, this is a longstanding tradition in the NBA where you go home-and-home, though the relatively new one over the last five years or so is the baseball series where you play the same team twice in one location. So this is not anything new, but Phoenix is having a great year. Brooks, you gotta give him his credit. I mean, everywhere he goes, he makes his team better. He competes and we know he’s gonna try to get under our skin and Draymond’s gonna try to get under theirs and should be a great couple of games.

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