Steve Kerr: Warriors’ Big 3 dealing with “fatigue”

Steve Kerr: Warriors’ Big 3 dealing with “fatigue”

We are locked and loaded ready to go he’s here Steve cerr is brought to you by Xfinity at home or on the go you’ll get the fastest internet to all your devices and presented by Great Clips in sports success is about team effort and the same is true for your hair Great

Clips it’s going to be great and so is our conversation because it always is we welcome in the coach Steve cerr hey coach how you doing tonight I’m doing well how are you guys doing we’re we’re doing good but I’m sure you feel it it

Looked like it was you know that way on your face in the uh in the the press conference last night that was a little bit of a deflating performance and I think that people are are looking at the inconsistency of the performances and and wondering why why why do you feel

Like this team kind of kind of looks a little bit different each time we see it well I think uh it’s kind of the nature of where the group is you know we’re um we’re mixing a lot of younger players with older players uh you know the the older guys are still

Playing at a really high level um but you know maybe not quite as capable as they were five years ago of kind of willing us to a win on a night like last night where shots aren’t going in and um you know the young guys are still

Learning um how to how to win a game like that how to compete how to rev up uh the defense you know without fouling how to uh just kind of manufacture a win on a night when things aren’t going your way so I think the bottom line is our

Our team is good enough to beat anybody and anybody can beat us too I mean it’s it’s also it’s kind of the nature of the league right now I mean I just think the league is more stacked than it’s ever been there’s more good teams than I’ve

Ever seen so from one night to the next it’s it’s really difficult yeah it’s challenging and you look at last night you roll out your starting five that looked to be the five that is the most reliable in the best and you come out and have a really kind of dreadful

Opening to the Ball Game what did you look at in the opening four to six minutes that that really troubled you in the fact that you guys fell behind by so much so early I thought New York set the tone defensively right away with their physicality and they kind of knocked us

Off of our uh lanes and and um they clogged the paint and um you know they they they let us know you know they were going to be there um all night in those first five minutes and so we didn’t really get any clean looks we we had

Three turnovers I think um trying to force the issue a little bit but it was the exact opposite of our game in New York a couple of weeks ago when we got off to the 14 nothing start and controlled the game from there I thought that that game was really won by New

York in the first quarter and um give them credit they were they were fantastic Steve Memphis in town tomorrow night uh we we saw a report of questionable for Raymond Green what what can you tell us about his status well he was uh he was a little

Banged up last night uh his back was bothering a little bit and um so he was getting some treatment at halftime um I think he’s feeling a lot better today I saw him at practice um so we’ll put we’ll mark him as questionable but um you know he’s played a lot of minutes

Lately and the the the the back kept him out of the game in Dallas last week so we’re just trying to to stay ahead of it and not you know not allow this to become a problem but I’ll just lean on on Rick and the the training staff and

They’ll they’ll figure it out does playing him less at center help to lessen the burden on his back or is the back not at all related to the position that he plays when he’s out there I don’t think it’s related really um you know when we do put him at the four with

Trace at the five it’s it’s really more to lighten the uh the emotional burden of having to carry the the defense it’s kind of nice for Draymond to have a shot blocker behind him you know he loves playing center field loves trying to muck things up for for the offense and

And uh you know helping all over the map um when he’s doing that as a five occasionally it leaves the rim unprotected and he can get frustrated when that happens but with Trace back there it lets Draymond play a little different role and take some of the uh

The rim protection burden off of him Coach Steve ker with us as as always weekly here Will and dibs 957 the game coach with all the lineups that you’ve played with throughout the year do you feel like you’re still tinkering and searching a bit or do you do you have

The group in mind that you want to go with the rest of the way no I I feel good about where we are right now I like the starting lineup I know last night it wasn’t great but it’s been really good for for a long stretch here and uh so I

Have total faith in the in that starting group and then you know it’s so great to have Chris Paul back he’s he’s an amazing player and to have him and Clay you know anchoring that that second unit um I think we’ve got a really good foundation you know to have um 48

Minutes of really good good basketball the the the tough part for us as a staff is just figuring out who’s going to close games because we don’t we don’t have a definite five and it’s going to be night tonight who’s playing well and and you know at times as a as a coach

That’s a difficult position to be in because sometimes a lot of people are playing well or sometimes nobody’s playing well and so you’re going to you’re going to have to make some guesses and you know you’d much rather be in a situation like we were five

Years ago where you just you know who your finishing five are if you’re healthy and you just put those guys out there every night regardless pods with a quiet night didn’t score in 25 minutes are you seeing him hit a bit of a rookie

Wall and if so how can you find ways to get him back to being more impactful especially in the offensive end yeah he had a tough night but that’s um you know to be expected especially as a rookie and as as you mentioned down the stretch of the season I mean he’s

Played a lot of minutes this year uh but he still plays with a lot of energy um I think the biggest thing is just uh continuing to show him tape of you know things he can improve upon and remind him of uh you know the details that are

Really important for him but I’m not worried about him at all he’s he’s a really good young player there and plays with a lot of lot of energy and force and he’s he’s been a big help for us this year coach this one might be uh

Might be tough for for for you to give a a real true honest answer but uh your team is filled with guys who have such resumés and so to be battling it out for playin positioning I got to wonder if there’s motivational issues for them and Draymond Green seemed to speak to that

Recently um you know kind of having a hard time getting up for battling for the nine and the 10 seed is is that an issue for you guys I don’t think so you know Draymond hasn’t said that to me I I I just think that you know my guess is that after a

Decade of this um you know playing into June so many playoff games um there’s there’s just fatigue involved at times and and I think that’s probably what Draymond was referring to I can tell you this if you know if if we’re in the play um situation um and we’ve got to we’ve

Got to win a game or two game we will be incredibly motivated and if we uh if if we’re if we end up in that spot I will remind the guys Miami made the finals uh from that spot a year ago the Lakers made the Conference Finals from that

Spot so we we have everything in front of us we have our goals in front of us and and even though it’s been an uneven season and you know a lot of UPS and downs I will believe until till the season is 100% finished I will believe

In our ability to to beat anybody and as long as we have that we got a shot how do you get that level of of consistency back to where it was even a couple of weeks ago when you went on that run when you won 13 to 17 it feels of late it’s

Been one step forward one step back and not being able to to play at that consistent level well yeah I mean there’s there’s a always uh mistakes that you see on film um that you can correct um there’s always uh you know things that that play teams are learning as they go through

The season um all of that stuff matters um but with that said you know we are a team that’s really doesn’t have a a great margin for error and so um while I said you know we’re we’re capable of beating anybody um and I believe that anybody’s

Capable of coming in and beating us and because most of the games are going to be really close I think it’s probably true we’ve played more clutch games than any team in the league this year that’s going to continue and some nights it’s just as simple as you know making shots

Versus um you know the other the other team not making them or vice versa and so we got to just try to take care of all the margins everything that we can handle ourselves we got to handle and then we just we got to perform we got to

We got to put the ball in the hole coach will you take us through uh the sideline process of Replay and and you’ve been very outspoken in not loving it in a lot of situations uh but I’ll Spotlight an example last night where it looked like Trace Jackson Davis got called for a

Foul where there was actually zero contact and and and there was no there was no challenge what what what was the process there for you on the sideline so we have a monitor behind the bench and we have two coach is uh Seth Cooper and and Jacob Rubin who are

Monitoring uh the monitor so they uh they look at the replay and they and and and I turn around and I I you know I I give them um you know they give me the uh the thumb up or the thumb down the problem is the monitor doesn’t always

Have a good view and uh so sometimes they’ll just you know they’ll give me the thumbs down because they don’t have a good view that’s what happened last night um they didn’t have a good view we only had at the time I think we only had

Uh two timeouts left and um I did not or it might have been three but I did not want to risk it on a play that they don’t see and um you know in a situation where um we feel it’s likely to be um not to

Be overturned now after the fact I did see the replay after the game from a different angle that our guys didn’t have and it was clear that Trace didn’t touch him so yeah we’d like to have that one back but you know you have a process

You follow it and and you always have to factor in your your timeout situation and uh and the challenge situation itself because if you lose it and you don’t have one at the end and something happens and you’re not able to challenge a play then you know then you then you

Kind of RW that one as well yeah you kind of RW the system in general Steve I know you and I are kind of in lock step on the system because you get the one Challenge and yet later in the game you had the gp2 flagrant that’s

Automatically reviewed to see if it’s a flagrant so that’s not a challenge and then you determined that because he landed underneath the shooter that’s now a flagrant and yet you can’t challenge that in any sort of way is that kind of leading to additional frustration about this overall challenge

System personally I just I I think the the flow of the game is much more important important than uh this um impossible quest to get everything right you know there there’s so much unintended consequence of replay um and and but one consequence that we clearly have felt over the years

Is just these stoppages in play that are terrible for everybody uh the Laker game on Sunday was just insane now that was more because of the shot clock but what what fed into that was the multiple challenges just before that but you know that what what I don’t like with with

Replay is that there are times where the the game is taken out of the officials hands and for a good example is is what happened Sunday against the Lakers you know wigs has inside position Lakers kind of go over his back knock it out of bounds it’s our ball you know the

A good ref doesn’t call a foul and just gives gives possession to the team that had you know that inside position that’s exactly what the ref did I thought that was the right call but if you really want to go to the replay and microscopic you know camera angle and see that the

Ball actually hit wigan’s fingernail potentially on the way out but you can’t quite tell um then and then you overturn it well then I’m going to say well he actually got fouled like so you know why but you can’t go back and call the foul right

And so you you just get into these situations where it’s like oh all these unintended consequences you take the take the the matter out of a good official’s hands who can ref based on what what’s the right outcome and uh and then all of a sudden the the crowd is

Just sitting there you know the the momentum is gone from the game and the viewing experience is bad so in my mind uh I would eliminate if I were you know in charge of everything which I’m not I would eliminate all replay other than buzzer beaters just did did did a guy

Get a shot off at the end of the game and at the end of every quarter and that’s it Steve cerr with us Willard and dibs 957 the game this is kind of a fun one coach uh Lebron James on uh on the mind the game podcast recently said that

In his lifetime of watching basketball Allan Iverson and Steph Curry are the two most influential players what’s your reaction to that I think that’s uh really really accurate um I and I would agree without really giving it a ton of thought um because the way everybody handles the

Ball these days is a direct result of what Iverson did you know and and the purists can argue that it’s a carry or whatever but you know he literally created a move that every player in the league now is using which is kind of the the the crossover you know the semi

Carry in One Direction the crossover the other the entire league uses it and that that came from directly from him and then what’s Ste has done is he’s just made it normal to to shoot a million threes and to shoot 32 Footers and and you know nobody else did that before him

Yeah I agree with LeBron it’s so fun to watch I was telling mark that I referee a lot of Youth Basketball coo and all these kids now are trying to go behind the back and hoisting 25f Footers because your guy has made that uh day regur has made it made it very normal

And Steve I I want to highlight Klay Thompson last night and just get your thoughts on transition he’s made to the bench a season High eight assist for clay in a game where he he’s starting to look really really comfortable coming off the bench how impressed are you by

How he’s assimilated to that new role Clay’s been great and and you know the best part for me as his coach is just seeing him really comfortable and at peace with his role now I think he was fighting that a little bit early in the season he wanted so desperately to be

The same clay from 5 years ago and and he just couldn’t get past the injuries and and what the injuries did to his career and to him and it was bothering him and he was trying too hard out there on the floor and I think um he over the

All-Star break he really got his thoughts together um realized that maybe you know coming off the bench could be a good thing and he’s embraced it and he has been fantastic not only his play but um his attitude his approach his leadership uh Clay’s been great and it’s

Been really fun to see coach what about this it was on January 5th that Shams had a story that Jonathan kaminga had lost faith in your ability to develop him as a young player last week uh pretty much about two plus months later he said he wants to be a warrior for the

Rest of his life take take us through what happened I I think uh you know JK came to this team um while you know all of his uh counterparts around the league who were drafted you know near him they all went to Lottery teams and immediately got 30 minutes a game and he

Came to a team that had chance Championship aspirations and in fact won the championship you know his rookie year and so it’s been a difficult Road for him and I have coached him hard and and I have held him accountable for you know some of the the youthful mistakes

He’s made um but you know I think we’ve we’ve really found Common Ground I think in a in in a weird way maybe it was good you know for him for that to story to come out because it forced us to really have in-depth conversations about expectations and you know I I definitely

Gave him more of an opportunity that he seized and I think he’s really come into his own and it’s it’s great to see because he’s a really really good young guy and uh handles himself well and uh and he’s earned everything he’s gotten and by and large he’s kind of become the

Two ostensibly on your team behind Steph in many ways and one player that fans continue to voice frustration over is Andrew Wiggins 24 minutes last night didn’t seem to have a huge impact on the offensive end what can you do and what are the conversations like in terms of

Trying to get Andrew more forceful and more consistent here down the stretch yeah we want Andrew to be more aggressive he he had a great game in LA on Sunday um I think the the more aggressive he is looking for his shot the better there are times with our team

Where he gets lost in the in the shuffle a little bit you know we run our offense through stuff and Draymond obviously Chris Paul comes on to the floor and he’s going to have the ball in his hands and you know Clay’s going to get a lot

Of shots up and I think sometimes Andrew gets lost and and he’s not the kind of guy to demand the ball you know demand shots um so I think I’ve got to do a better job of keeping him engaged and and and really getting him in positions

To to attack and to be successful coach you got scoreboard watching of course every night all right so uh what where where’s your mind on that front right now like what’s because you know you guys had said uh and shared with the public a few weeks ago that a

Stated goal was the six seed um yeah what what about now has that evolved at all well it’s it’s uh it’s definitely going going to be more difficult um than you know than I would have anticipated I I thought we were in a really good place and I think Steph’s injury knocked us

Off course a little bit um and you know now we’re on the outside looking in on on this on the race for six but we don’t really control you know anything other than ourselves and so the only thing we can do is uh you know get better keep keep plugging away and just

Keep pushing forward and end up with the best possible seed whatever that is and and uh as I as I just said you know Miami and the Lakers great examples last year coming out of the playin and and making great playoff runs so we I know

We can do this but we we’ve just got to keep plugging away yeah Dallas uh leading the Spurs right now by six early first we’re all team popovic over here suddenly rooting for uh for San Antonio uh March Madness Steve it’s big week and I know you remember your days at Arizona

How many brackets will you fill out and how far do you have your wild cats advancing in this year’s tournament um I’ll just do one bracket we we have a team bracket every year uh that David foki in our front office runs and uh I’ll I’ll get on in on that and I

Will pick Arizona to win the whole thing because you know that’s what you do well except for in the in the in the coaching community I thought for sure you’d be rooting for a guy like Dan Monson after what’s taking place so at Long Beach

State uh fired and then ends up in the tournament so I thought you’d say one and done for the cats no no I I rooted hard for him to win the conference tournament and and that happened so my rooting is done all right sorry and the

Draw is what the draw is you got to go with those cats that’s the end of that all right that’s right all right well coach good luck good luck we’ll be watching obviously tomorrow night against uh Memphis thank you as always all right thanks guys take care you too

There it is Steve Kerr right here on Willard and dibs

Warriors head coach Steve Kerr joins Willard and Dibs to react to last night’s Warriors loss to the Knicks, the confidence he has in the team going forward, and more.

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