I didn't mean a "super elite 7 foot guy". That won't happen. Guards don't think twice about going to the basket against Warriors., even as good as the Warriors can be defensively in the paint. Even a backup rim protector could help. Green and Loony seem to always be battling against bigger opponents. The Kings being the exception. They both excel in the paint but too often appear to be at a disadvantage. Kerr just doesn't think getting a Big as necessary.
In the aftermath of a blowout elimination loss in the Western Conference semifinals, the Phoenix Suns fired coach Monty Williams on Saturday night, sources told ESPN. New Suns owner Mat Ishbia made the decision to dismiss Williams
Ishbia has fully taken over the franchise's basketball operations, including the negotiation of the February trade for Kevin Durant and now the dismissal of Williams. Suns general manager James Jones called Williams on Saturday night and delivered the news to him, sources said.
Ishbia had never warmed to Williams as his coach and decided quickly after Thursday night's loss to the Denver Nuggets in Game 6 of the Western Conference semifinals that he would fire him, sources said.
The Suns, league sources say, are expected to explore the feasibility of trying to lure Tyronn Lue away from the Clippers after tonight's abrupt dismissal of Monty Williams as coach.
Genuinely surprised the Lakers didn't night night us at the end of game 6. There really wasn't much animosity in this series outside of the flop talk though. Both top dogs from each team respect each other way too much.
Hope I'm not reposting. Mentioned Moody's response earlier.
Shayna Rubin
@ShaynaRubin
Some insightful responses in exit interviews about how the bench’s experience was the biggest difference between this and last season. Lot of learned lessons the hard way.
Did you see how close AD could get to the basket before even considering shooting? And how difficult it was for the Warriors to go to the basket and then thinking twice when AD was there in the paint. Sure it worked great when pulling him out of the paint on P&R's but playing w/o a Big leaves little room for error. And then, when your stars are shooting bricks, you'll lose. Staying with just Draymond at 6'6" and Loony at 6'9" is a disadvantage you can't count on.
I feel like Kerr is a bit under appreciated. Yeah, his rotations were frustrating, but he and his staff were responsible for solving the issue of attacking AD in the paint (ended up scoring more paint points than the Lakers for most of the series) and dealing with the Sabonis DHOs/Fox PnRs against Sac and held a historically great offence to just league average. The core may have played way too many minutes and others didn't get much of a chance (What was the point of signing Lamb?), but I feel like he did try his best to set up the team for success on the court. He was just limited with his personnel and team chemistry was a mess.
It's not Kerr's fault if Steph and Draymond are throwing blind passes into the stands or players are failing to inbound the balls in their own half. What is he supposed to do if his only backup PG fouls on every drive and refuses to slow down no matter how much he tells them to hit singles. At the end of the day Kerr can only give instructions and it's up to the players to execute.
And you know that how? How 'bout in exchange for Dray the Warriors get a younger player with a future who may not be a 1st team All Star player but gives you 18 ppg instead of 8, has a turnover-to-assist ratio of 5 instead of 3 and who doesn't lead the league in ejections and doesn't punch rising star teammates in the face. Plus he's a major f'ing distraction on the court with the refs. His value is way overrated IMO. And the reality is he only has probably one good year left.
I didn't realize that next year is Kerr's last year of his contract. Blow it up, I say.
No Dray, Klay, GP2, Kerr and Bob. Hire a coach who will
- start Rollins, Poole, Moody, JK and PBJ and play them heavy minutes
- Change the system to be JK centric.
- Play rookies we get for Dray, Klay and Gp2 heavy minutes.
- Bring Steph, Wiggs and Loon come off the bench and play them as little a minutes as possible.Steph needs to learn to be humble and learn to live under JK's shadow. Dude couldnt even win a series against 38 yr old LeBron. Enough hubris.
i believe this is evident and obvious but did Kerr’s comment about this “not being a championship team” seem directed to the FO and ownership, ie, he wasn’t dissing the players themselves?
In my view Kerrs refusal to play Jonathan Kuminga was the difference in this series The last few months of the season Kuminga shot 56% FG, 44% from 3, 8 Reb, 2.5 Blks/Stls, 28 PTS per 48 minutes. He essentially played the Andrew Wiggins role., earning praise around the league for his defensive prowess and his ability to guard the other teams best players.
He is arguably the most athletic player on the team.....the most physical. One of the best on-ball defenders. He has a pretty good post up game. Especially against smaller players. So many times we've seen him ignite the team by making a highlight reel type play or dunk. Players feed off that. Sometimes thats all it takes to get other players like Klay and Poole going and spark a run.
I can't understand for the life of me how you can take a player like that and determine he isn't even good to get in the game. Especially w/ everyone else struggling.
Think of all the shots Reaves, Schroeder, Walker, even Lebron made with a 6'2 Curry, GP, Dante guarding them. Against a 6'7 Kuminga they likely miss a few more of those shots per game. Think of all the wide open shots the dubs missed.... Kuminga easily could've made 3 or 4 of those shots.
Not to mention the extra rest Klay, Curry, Dray would've had per game to keep their legs fresh. Fatigue played a role in their late game and late series struggles. They've literally played an extra season of basketball due to all of their Championship runs. With some extra rest, maybe those open shots they missed start going in. And that 17 point 4th quarter turns into 23 or 24.
A few extra stops and a few extra buckets here and there was literally the difference between the dubs being down 3-1 w/ 2 home games left and up 3-1 w/ 2 home games left. And we'd be telling a completely different story. I'm so disappointed in Kerr.
This loss is seriously Kerr's fault, and I am not a hater. He has made some horrible decisions that has cost games, both in strategy and who he uses and not uses in games. I couldnt agree more with Brad in CBS comments here: https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/warriors-vs-lakers-why-steve-kerr-deserves-bulk-of-blame-for-golden-states-3-1-hole/
This loss is seriously Kerr's fault, and I am not a hater. He has made some horrible decisions that has cost games, both in strategy and who he uses and not uses in games. I couldnt agree more with Brad in CBS comments here: https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/warriors-vs-lakers-why-steve-kerr-deserves-bulk-of-blame-for-golden-states-3-1-hole/
I didn't mean a "super elite 7 foot guy". That won't happen. Guards don't think twice about going to the basket against Warriors., even as good as the Warriors can be defensively in the paint. Even a backup rim protector could help. Green and Loony seem to always be battling against bigger opponents. The Kings being the exception. They both excel in the paint but too often appear to be at a disadvantage. Kerr just doesn't think getting a Big as necessary.
In the aftermath of a blowout elimination loss in the Western Conference semifinals, the Phoenix Suns fired coach Monty Williams on Saturday night, sources told ESPN. New Suns owner Mat Ishbia made the decision to dismiss Williams
Ishbia has fully taken over the franchise's basketball operations, including the negotiation of the February trade for Kevin Durant and now the dismissal of Williams. Suns general manager James Jones called Williams on Saturday night and delivered the news to him, sources said.
Ishbia had never warmed to Williams as his coach and decided quickly after Thursday night's loss to the Denver Nuggets in Game 6 of the Western Conference semifinals that he would fire him, sources said.
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/37644346/sources-suns-dismiss-coach-monty-williams-4-seasons
The Suns, league sources say, are expected to explore the feasibility of trying to lure Tyronn Lue away from the Clippers after tonight's abrupt dismissal of Monty Williams as coach.
https://twitter.com/thesteinline/status/1657565074595143682
Genuinely surprised the Lakers didn't night night us at the end of game 6. There really wasn't much animosity in this series outside of the flop talk though. Both top dogs from each team respect each other way too much.
Hate to get all all TMZ, but apparently an uncredited report came out that Draymond punched Poole for being disrespectful to Kerr?
Anywhere to see a Moses Moody post game or exit interview? Cannot find on YouTube.
Hope I'm not reposting. Mentioned Moody's response earlier.
Shayna Rubin
@ShaynaRubin
Some insightful responses in exit interviews about how the bench’s experience was the biggest difference between this and last season. Lot of learned lessons the hard way.
https://twitter.com/ShaynaRubin/status/1657473176325210114
And from Wiggins:
https://twitter.com/ShaynaRubin/status/1657473592232226816
Things to look forward to RS start (approximate dates):
June last week: Draft
July 1st week: California classic/Summer League
July 2nd week: Free agency
August last week+Sept first 10 days: FIBA world cup. I wonder if Dray and Klay will play. I doubt Steph plays
Oct mid: Preseason begins
Oct end: RS begins
Did you see how close AD could get to the basket before even considering shooting? And how difficult it was for the Warriors to go to the basket and then thinking twice when AD was there in the paint. Sure it worked great when pulling him out of the paint on P&R's but playing w/o a Big leaves little room for error. And then, when your stars are shooting bricks, you'll lose. Staying with just Draymond at 6'6" and Loony at 6'9" is a disadvantage you can't count on.
I feel like Kerr is a bit under appreciated. Yeah, his rotations were frustrating, but he and his staff were responsible for solving the issue of attacking AD in the paint (ended up scoring more paint points than the Lakers for most of the series) and dealing with the Sabonis DHOs/Fox PnRs against Sac and held a historically great offence to just league average. The core may have played way too many minutes and others didn't get much of a chance (What was the point of signing Lamb?), but I feel like he did try his best to set up the team for success on the court. He was just limited with his personnel and team chemistry was a mess.
It's not Kerr's fault if Steph and Draymond are throwing blind passes into the stands or players are failing to inbound the balls in their own half. What is he supposed to do if his only backup PG fouls on every drive and refuses to slow down no matter how much he tells them to hit singles. At the end of the day Kerr can only give instructions and it's up to the players to execute.
"Without Dray we’ll have a bottom 5-10 defense"
And you know that how? How 'bout in exchange for Dray the Warriors get a younger player with a future who may not be a 1st team All Star player but gives you 18 ppg instead of 8, has a turnover-to-assist ratio of 5 instead of 3 and who doesn't lead the league in ejections and doesn't punch rising star teammates in the face. Plus he's a major f'ing distraction on the court with the refs. His value is way overrated IMO. And the reality is he only has probably one good year left.
I didn't realize that next year is Kerr's last year of his contract. Blow it up, I say.
No Dray, Klay, GP2, Kerr and Bob. Hire a coach who will
- start Rollins, Poole, Moody, JK and PBJ and play them heavy minutes
- Change the system to be JK centric.
- Play rookies we get for Dray, Klay and Gp2 heavy minutes.
- Bring Steph, Wiggs and Loon come off the bench and play them as little a minutes as possible.Steph needs to learn to be humble and learn to live under JK's shadow. Dude couldnt even win a series against 38 yr old LeBron. Enough hubris.
Let's go. WGBC next year.
/s
i believe this is evident and obvious but did Kerr’s comment about this “not being a championship team” seem directed to the FO and ownership, ie, he wasn’t dissing the players themselves?
In my view Kerrs refusal to play Jonathan Kuminga was the difference in this series The last few months of the season Kuminga shot 56% FG, 44% from 3, 8 Reb, 2.5 Blks/Stls, 28 PTS per 48 minutes. He essentially played the Andrew Wiggins role., earning praise around the league for his defensive prowess and his ability to guard the other teams best players.
He is arguably the most athletic player on the team.....the most physical. One of the best on-ball defenders. He has a pretty good post up game. Especially against smaller players. So many times we've seen him ignite the team by making a highlight reel type play or dunk. Players feed off that. Sometimes thats all it takes to get other players like Klay and Poole going and spark a run.
I can't understand for the life of me how you can take a player like that and determine he isn't even good to get in the game. Especially w/ everyone else struggling.
Think of all the shots Reaves, Schroeder, Walker, even Lebron made with a 6'2 Curry, GP, Dante guarding them. Against a 6'7 Kuminga they likely miss a few more of those shots per game. Think of all the wide open shots the dubs missed.... Kuminga easily could've made 3 or 4 of those shots.
Not to mention the extra rest Klay, Curry, Dray would've had per game to keep their legs fresh. Fatigue played a role in their late game and late series struggles. They've literally played an extra season of basketball due to all of their Championship runs. With some extra rest, maybe those open shots they missed start going in. And that 17 point 4th quarter turns into 23 or 24.
A few extra stops and a few extra buckets here and there was literally the difference between the dubs being down 3-1 w/ 2 home games left and up 3-1 w/ 2 home games left. And we'd be telling a completely different story. I'm so disappointed in Kerr.