Trayce Jackson-Davis on rebounding “from the nail”
[pre-G4-MIN-GSW videos/transcripts]
Transcripts from morning shootaround and pregame before Game 4 Warriors-Wolves below, but Trayce Jackson-Davis pointed out a game plan adjustment that the Warriors actually solved even as they went down 3-1 in the Western Conference Semifinals: rebounding.
“They shot a lot of threes and there was a lot of long rebounds,” Jackson-Davis said after morning shootaround. “I feel like we were just rushing in and usually we come from the nail and then kind of looked to see where the ball's at, but we were just running in and then they were getting long rebounds and so I felt like we did a good job hitting, but that part of it, we just need to key in on.”
Btw, in case you’re unfamiliar with, the “nail” refers to the free throw line, actually, the exact center of it. On probably every basketball court made of hardwood, there’s a nail that’s been nailed into the middle of the free throw line. It actually helps guide a free throw shooter to line up to the rim. One Wardell Stephen Curry uses it every time, tapping his right toe on it before straightening out his stance, making sure the nail is between both his feet. He does right before every time he shoots a free throw.
And so, because three-point misses tend to bounce off the rim further away to the “elbows”, the literal strategy of rebounding in the modern NBA entails being at the nail or somewhere near the free throw line, fifteen feet away from the rim, to track down those boards. This strategy is the reason why Golden State is always atop the NBA in rebounding — and how Curry gets his rebounds in motion — even though they are one of the smallest teams and Steph is usually the shortest guy on the floor.
Kerr has talked about rebounding at length in the past. One piece of terminology his staff has come up with is “stays”, which is sort of the negative result of not obeying the above rebounding strategy:
Anyways, the Game 4 stats:
Wolves had 38 rebounds, 6 of them offensive
Warriors had… drum roll… 38 rebounds, 14 of them offensive.
As I’ll discuss in the next article I post, Steve Kerr had the squad executing the “formula”, but it abruptly ended roughly five minutes into the third quarter as Minnesota rattled off four straight possessions of three points each: an Anthony Edwards acrobatic and-one, then three straight threes. Even Mike Conley hit a dagger pull-up splash on the break in that run as the Wolves eventually finished 16-for-34 beyond the arc. A 68-68 tie became 80-68 as Kerr called timeout and, later, Draymond Green on the podium revealed that Jimmy Butler was sick, which explains his “ofer” and general passivity of not being able to stem the tide during that critical stretch, eventually ending the game with only nine field goal attempts.
Again, I’ll talk about this in the next post with all the postgame podia reaction, but the formula actually worked — until it didn’t. And if Butler isn’t 100% then you have no superstar to stem the tide or close the game. We’ll talk about what Steve can do about that in Game 6 next article.
Incidentally, Raymond Ridder and the rest of the Warriors PR crew won their eighth PBWA Brian McIntyre Media Relations Award for the 2024-25 season. The presentation is actually in the Kerr pregame video. PBWA Vice President Sam Amick said, prior to Kerr taking the podium, that they actually had to change the rules so that Golden State wouldn’t be winning it every year — they had won the award four straight years starting with the 2015-16 season. My only problem with all this is… you can’t see Cole Lawrence’s signature ponytail in the photo in the press release 😆 — just kidding, I love the ponytail, of course! But in all seriousness, kudos to Raymond, Brett Winkler, Michael Ravina, Cole, Darryl Arata, not to mention game-day part-time helpers Eamonn Sweeney, James Kincaid, Kaitlyn Frysztak, Jordan Mansfield and Dani Mernick for a job well done, with a job that is quite honestly very difficult to execute. And LetsGoWarriors wouldn’t be where it is today without their partnership over the years.
Finally, check out our latest podcast which delves into the sudden new identity of these Warriors (YouTube, Spotify and iTunes):
The following transcripts will be unlocked from the paywall when that posts. That being said, the transcripts from the previous article are now unlocked. Here are TJD and Gary Payton II from morning shootaround and Kerr pregame, where Trayce’s rebounding strategy above was reiterated, too.
00:00 Trayce, we saw Ant almost dunk on you last game. What's it like trying to guard him at the rim?
00:09 TRAYCE JACKSON-DAVIS, MORNING SHOOTAROUND BEFORE G4-MIN-GSW: It's difficult. He's a great player, especially when he gets a full head of steam, so meeting him early, but also knowing that Gobert's a lob threat. So you gotta trust the help behind, but meeting him early is really the only thing you can do with him, but yeah.
00:25 How are you guys feeling about the game tonight?
00:27 I'm feeling great. It's gonna be rocking. Gotta come out with a lot of energy, play with force and pace and just go out there and hoop.
00:37 Going back to Anthony Edwards, he had 28 shots last game. Is there — when you're watching the film, is there a way that you guys can limit his shot attempts or is it just a matter of he's gonna get his shots up?
00:49 He's gonna get his, especially when you shoot 28 shots, but just making it difficult for him. Can't let him find a rhythm, getting open threes and stuff of that nature, getting easy looks at the rim and so, stuff of that nature. We just gotta make sure that we're on 'em at all times, making every shot difficult.
01:06 What are what ar the keys on the glass? It seemed like Minnesota, as big as they are —
01:11 Just hitting, boxing out. There was a — they shot a lot of threes and there was a lot of long rebounds and I feel like we were just rushing in and usually we come from the nail and then kind of looked to see where the ball's at, but we were just running in and then they were getting long rebounds and so I felt like we did a good job hitting, but that part of it, we just need to key in on.
01:31 That was a really good playmaking game from Randle, specifically. How do you shut that drive and kick game off?
01:37 Just when he drives, we know he likes that spin and I think sometimes we get a little antsy and want to come help and we gotta live with that fade away that he takes and just push out to guys. And he played well yesterday when we gotta take those things away.
01:53 When you were out of the rotation, what were your conversations like with Steve that ultimately led to now you capitalizing on the opportunity in front of you now?
02:01 Yeah, me and Coach had a few conversations. He was telling me I did a great job. It was nothing about how I played or what I was doing, it was just what was working at the time. And so he's always telling me to stay ready, 'cause you never know and then, he called my name in Game 2 and I played well. And now, we're here and so I just gotta keep playing hard and playing for my teammates.
02:22 Similarly, just what's impressed you about the way that Jonathan has kind of handled himself in the same manner?
02:28 Yeah JK, especially being so young, him just being so mature about everything, just his mannerism, how he is, still just a great teammate, a great friend, and I salute him because he deserves everything that's happening right now.
02:43 Both you and JK have talked about the importance of staying ready. What does it take to stay ready when you maybe aren't in the rotation or getting limited minutes?
02:52 Yeah, I feel like it's kind of a gift, honestly, because you get to work out, you get to work on your game, but at the same time, just watching, seeing how guys are and talking to the vets like Draymond, Steph, Jimmy, they're giving you confidence and stuff of that nature. And so you just gotta continue to work on your craft, continue to work on your game and whenever your name's called, be ready to go.
03:17 How much does the possibility of Steph coming back in the series and the need to extend it to him to get to a point where maybe he can come back loom? How much of a talking point is that?
03:28 It's definitely there, but we gotta take things one game at a time. We can't look forward. We can't look at anything else. We gotta just focus on this game and come out. We know how good Steph is and how much he means to us and, obviously, we want to play to win already, but with him out, we wanna play for him as well and so it just adds an extra chip on your shoulder.
03:49 Steve talks a lot about meeting physicality and this concept of physicality. What does that look like in practical terms? Does that just make them feel you on screens, box out hard? Lik what do you, what do you think about?
04:00 Yeah, I feel like we talked about in the Houston series and how we were hitting and their shots, it was a lot different because they don't shoot as much threes and so everything was at the rim and it was kind of a war inside. Well, this team shoots a lot of threes and so making sure we hit kind of what I talked about earlier, where we can't just run in and try to get the rebound because there's so many long rebounds and stuff. So almost playing with — playing hard, but also playing with force and just being smart about what we're doing.
04:28 Brandin was obviously pretty frustrated, especially in the first half the other night. What do you say to a shooter like that? How do you guys lift him up so that he can perform well tonight?
04:39 You gotta wash it, at the end of the day. He didn't make a lot of shots, but he's gonna have a chance tonight and he's just gotta watch that performance and just continue to shoot the ball. He's a great player. He's a great shooter. He's someone that's super-confident and so I don't think I'll have a problem with that at all.
04:57 Trayce, Steve is talking about how he's close to finding a formula of how to play without Steph to win without Steph. And you guys were really close at just finishing better and things like that. What have you learned about how you guys have to play without Steph in order to win?
05:12 We gotta play fast. We gotta play with a lot of pick-and-roll with Gobert in it, but honestly, just pushing the pace and making sure we get to our spacing and so with Steph out, he commands a lot of attention. He commands a lot of presence and he creates a lot of spacing for us and so with him out, we gotta rely more on getting to certain spots on the floor and making sure that we can shift the defense, so.
05:36 And did that last game, how much confidence did they give you guys in just going into Jimmy, but also with Jonathan too?
05:41 Yeah, we all know what Jimmy can do, but JK just coming in and asserting himself. It's not the first time we've seen it. He's played like this before. I remember Houston in the middle of the season before he got hurt and so he's gonna have to carry us and we have faith in him.
06:03 That it? Thank you.
06:04 Thanks.
—
06:05 Steve had said that he was looking for a formula of how to win without —
06:09 GARY PAYTON II: Who?
06:09 Steve Kerr. He was looking for a formula of how to win without Steph and he felt like you guys are very close to finding it. It was just like a matter of kind of closing better this last game, but what have you guys learned of how you guys have to play without Steph in order to win?
06:25 Like you said, we just gotta do a better job closing. Offensively I think that we get what we want, just gotta be locked in. Some mental lapses and mental turnovers put us in a kind of a bind last game, so we clean those up, I think we'll be in a good spot, late down the game to be able to close games.
06:48 Gary, Trayce talked about the need to play with pace play a little bit faster. Is that just getting out and running in transition or is there something that applies in the half court setting as well when it comes to playing with pace?
07:00 Just cut with a purpose, swing the ball, hit the open man, and like he said, in transition, just get out and try to find easy buckets and space the floor, get to the corners and attack the seams.
07:14 What kind of challenges does Randle present?
07:17 He's just a force, demands attention, but I think we've been doing a pretty good job on him, just making his aggressiveness tough when he drives, making it tough for him and making him shoot over Dray and whoever he's got down there.
07:39 How much does the possibility of Steph coming back in this series and the need to extend it, the series to that point, how much does that loom?
07:49 A lot.
07:50 Is it something you guys talk about?
07:53 No. Can't. It's out of our hands. When he is ready, he's ready.
07:59 How have you seen him recently? How is he doing mentally, energy-wise?
08:05 Same person, you know? He's just going through the steps, so when he gets out the cryo-chamber, he's ready.
08:13 That's a really good rebounding team over there and you guys are also a really good rebounding team. What specific challenges do they present?
08:22 Just got a couple footers. That's about it. Yeah, that's about it. You guys are great.
—
00:00 ANTHONY SLATER: It is the eighth time, I think, I saw seven out the last 10 years, I believe, and the eighth time overall. So congrats to this staff, Darryl Arata, Michael Ravina, Cole Lawrence, Brett Winkler, Ray Ridder. anything you wanna say? Vice president of the PBWA
00:19 SAM AMICK: Appreciate you all. The dynasty continues. You understand our jobs. You help us do our jobs. We had to change the rules so the Warriors couldn't win every single year. That's kind of all you need to know. So they're back. Should mention, too, the T-Wolves won last year. We appreciate them, but congrats guys. Amazing work.
00:35 RAYMOND RIDDER: Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that. You're on your own, Steve, your comment.
00:58 STEVE KERR, PREGAME G4-MIN-GSW: Hey Raymond. You're still no Tom James, so.
01:09 What does Playoff Raymond mean to you?
01:13 Random stats that don't really help me at all in these interviews. I texted Raymond this afternoon to congratulate him and his staff and then he sent something nice back. And then I told him, alright, let's erase these texts and get back to our more comfortable dynamic where we just insult each other all the time. So it was a short-lived celebration, but well-deserved. They do an amazing job.
01:42 What are some of the keys to slowing down Randall and what makes him such a tough matchup?
01:49 Well, he's a great player. He's physical. He's strong but skilled double-figure assists the last two games, so it's not a case of stopping him. It's stopping them and all in all, I mean, we held 'em to 102 the other night, so I think we did a decent job defensively, but in the fourth quarter he and Ant kind of took over. So we've gotta figure out a way to slow them down, especially late.
02:26 Steve, one of the inherent advantages you guys have when you're whole is the closing lineup and options that you have, you can put on the floor without Steph and without Draymond in the last game, as it turned out. How does that affect your philosophy on who's out there in a tight game in the final minutes and how much more difficult does it make your job in terms of planning how you're going to close games?
02:50 Yeah, well means we're probably gonna go with whatever lineup has the hot hand like we did the other night, with JK playing so well. But that's par for the course. If you have injuries, you have to adapt and so we'll adapt. Obviously, we'll play through Jimmy and key tonight is, again, our defense. Can we defend at a high level? Can we score off our defense? Can we get to loose balls, long rebounds, win the possession game? Those are the things we have to do without Steph.
03:29 Last game, you only had five three-point attempts in the first half. I was wondering how important is it to, I guess, increase three-point volume, but also how do you do that without just forcing up shots that maybe you guys don't wanna take?
03:41 Yeah, I mean, that's, again, to go back to our defense and rebounding, you can get them off offensive boards, so crashing, second chance opportunities, forcing turnovers getting out in transition and hitting threes that way, very difficult to do in the half court without Steph. And with, frankly, with a rotation that doesn't feature a ton of three-point shooters, so we have to generate those looks through our defense and rebounding.
04:13 And you and some of the players have talked about playing with pace. Does that just mean getting out in the open court or does that mean maybe getting your actions a little bit quicker in the half court? What does playing with pace mean to you?
04:23 It's throwing the ball ahead. I thought we had five or six possessions the other night where we didn't throw the ball ahead when someone was open and that's a really important part of the game. When you throw the ball ahead, it threatens the defense, it flattens the defense out and then there's there's plays to be made behind the play.
04:39 Steve, it felt like you came up with a blueprint in Game 3, at least some tactics to stay in the game. Guys got tired down the stretch, but what did you learn from Game 3 that you can carry over into Game 4?
04:51 Well, I mean, it's always a series-long process of learning and I don't look at it so much as Game 3 as I do all three of the first games and so we've seen some things defensively that we like. We've seen what they're doing defensively and you take every bit of film and you dissect it and you try to figure out what can we do to improve our chances of winning. So the things we've talked about, the pace, the offensive rebounding, forcing some turnovers, those are all things that we've kind of gleaned from the first three games.
05:29 To kind of follow up on that, when you talk about ways of winning, have you had any sidebar conversations with any of the guys, maybe Podziemski or Moses Moody, Buddy Hield, that have not necessarily been in these situations, but you're like, we need you to do — you're doing this. We need you to do this one thing 'cause this will make you more of a contributor in this game and we need that because Steph is not out there?
05:49 That's my job, so yes, I have conversations with our players all the time and we collaborate as a group we watch tape with the whole team and our older guys will chip in with thoughts for our younger guys, so that's really the process that we go through, for sure.
06:06 I guess specifically i'm asking if you had those conversations with and who you guys--
06:13 Yes and I am gonna specifically say, I'm not gonna answer that.
06:18 Steve, what do you appreciate about Jimmy's leadership style? I asked him after Game 3, the loss, about the urgency and tonight's game, but he basically said he had kind of as a calming force, like, "We can't change too much of what we do. We don't wanna make it bigger than it is." What do you appreciate about the way he kind of leads?
06:34 Just his calm under pressure, his comfort level in being the guy and taking on the responsibility and it's genuine behind-the-scenes. It's authentic while it's happening. He's a true clutch performer, just unafraid of the moment and willing to take on the responsibility that comes with that, so he's been amazing. I
07:01 Since — over here — since getting Jimmy, especially, you guys have been really good at generating points off turnovers. In the last game it didn't happen as much and I know they weren't all live-ball turnovers, but you had seven turnovers and no points off them in the fourth quarter. What do you think that is? Is it what you were saying before but not passing ahead or what was it?
07:23 Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, I think we can be more efficient for sure in creating advantages by throwing the ball ahead. There were several dead ball turnovers where they threw the ball out of bounds, so we're still setting up against their set defense, so yeah, I mean, we have to continue to push the pace, push the tempo, especially when we have advantages, whether it's a turnover or a guy is down, comes into the paint and shoots and falls down and it's a five-on-four. We have to take advantage of that in this series, for sure.
08:07 To state the obvious, Steve, a 2-2 series is different than a 3-1 series and I know you're not one to make speeches for your guys, they have the plan, it's on them to execute, but still coming to the arena today, what's your emotional read on where your team's at?
08:21 Team's in a great state. We understand the circumstances and we feel good about the matchup. We feel good about our ability to guard, Minnesota and we felt like we had some game plan mistakes, last game. I thought our guys played really, really hard, but we had some game plan discipline issues. And if we clean those things up, then we feel great about our chances to win tonight and we're looking at this as a great opportunity.
08:55 What are the keys on the defensive glass tonight?
08:58 The keys?
08:59 Yeah, on the defensive glass?
09:00 We lost our shell the other night. We talk about a defensive shell, where you got five guys who were kind of connected. There were a lot of shots that they took where we leaked out and the shell doesn't end until the possession ends, until we get the rebound. And we had way too many possessions the other night where we leaked out and kind of lost our foothold at the elbows where a lot of those long rebounds go, so we gotta clean that up for sure.
09:33 And Steve, down the stretch of the night, Draymond had foul out. Obviously, you didn't have him out there, but what did you miss about him not being out there in those last few minutes of the game? What might have changed for you?
09:45 Well, I mean, he's been there a million times and he's the best defender in the league and you're trying to get stops in the last four minutes of the game. And Draymond Green's not out there. You miss all of that, so hopefully he's there the last four tonight.
10:00 He's had some high-impact games in this postseason and some low-impact games. What do you need from him in this particular game tonight, besides staying on the floor?
10:08 I just think we — I thought he was in a little bit of a rush the other night. He had the five turnovers. I thought we were a little careless with the ball in the first half. We have to set a better tone and Draymond can help us do that. He's our leader. He's gonna handle the ball quite a bit with Steph out and I've seen Draymond bounce back from tough games a million times. I have no doubt he's gonna do that, so he's just gotta be the guy who has won a lot of championships and won a lot of playoff games and I'm sure he's gonna be that guy tonight. Thank you.
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