Explain: Jonathan Kuminga, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. A deep dive into the Blazers game
something for everyone
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In this episode, we carefully look at all the plays from Jonathan Kuminga's first quarter in the Golden State Warriors - Portland Trailblazers game on 2025-04-11. We analyze the team's strategies to utilize Kuminga, his overall performance, and his contributions on both offense and defense. Plus, we conduct a celebration audit of Jimmy Butler's circus shot and the divide between different schools of celebration analysis.
Starring Steph Curry, Draymond Green, Moses Moody, Buddy Hield, Kevon Looney, Gary Payton II, Kevin Knox, Brandin Podziemski and Jimmy Butler. With Kris Murray, Dalano Banton, and Jabari Walker.
Thanks for the video Eric, really enjoyed it.
I think the 4th offensive possession is the key to "unlocking" Kuminga's spacing. I feel like I'm beating a bit of a dead horse here because I emphasize it so much, but to me, the last thing you want is Kuminga standing in a corner. And I think, given how many of these clips Kuminga is involved in the action, the coaching staff knows this too.
That Buddy drive should be an AUTOMATIC backdoor baseline cut for JK in that situation. Pretty much any opposite side driver should lead to some type of downhill cut for him, whether a face cut or a backdoor.
Even if he doesn't get the ball, it almost certainly allows Buddy to skip to a sliding down Moody for an open 3.
In the circumstances where the play happens too quick for him to cut, the mindset should be quick swing (like he does to Moody here, albeit with clunky spacing because Buddy cuts out the same side) OR quickly into a dribble handoff to Moody, channeling the way GP2 and Draymond handle these situations.
Candidly, Draymond himself has shot way too many of these 3s this year instead of going into handoffs, which is what makes me think the staff is over emphasizing "staying spaced and shoot the open shot" in this scenario too much.
I will shout it until I'm blue in the face, spacing is not just about making open 3s!
The other point I'd make, on the defensive end, is that we rarely see Kuminga give up straight line drives. While his weakside help defense is a bit of a Salvador Dalí painting, he's one of probably only 3-4 guys who falls into this category in on ball defense (GP2, Dray, Jimmy).
The Warriors on ball defense often leaves a bit to be desired because they rarely don't have an exploitable defender to attack and while I like being switchable with the more interchangeable wing types, I'd like to see them not concede switches so easily late in game when people will just keep targeting Podz or Curry to attack. I'd like to see a bit more blitzing sprinkled in.
Truly something for everything is right. I watch the video and I just get frustrated by his offense. So many plays called for him and so many bad results. And yet, his rebounding was legit good. He actually saved a few possessions with his effort there, they weren't just empty calories.
But I think my biggest frustration with him (well, besides the pick six habit he seems to have gotten from Draymond and Steph and that he's not good enough to be forgiven for) is this quote: "in hindsight, it would have been better for JK to attack while the defense was rotating." It's a pattern that I worry will never disappear. JK doesn't see the optimal play quick enough to exploit it. Maybe it's a learnable skill, but I'm pessimistic. I see it happen quite a bit where he loses advantage in the halfcourt waiting a bit analyzing the court. And he's not good enough in isolation to willingly give up that advantage.
I will also say his defense was pretty good in this clip. Much easier to forgive being too aggressive than being too passive. He was definitely not coasting there, which does bring hope.