What Warriors coach Steve Kerr refuses to do with Stephen Curry
Yesterday at 01:51 PM
The Golden State Warriors have been up and down thus far on the 2024-25 NBA season, currently sitting at 18-17 following Sunday’s blowout home loss vs the Sacramento Kings. Stephen Curry has endured a rare shooting slump as of late, and the team’s recent acquisition of Dennis Schroder hasn’t exactly paid immediate dividends.
One key challenge for head coach Steve Kerr to address is how to simultaneously stack wins while also preserving the soon-to-be 37 year old Curry for the high leverage moments.
Recently, Kerr broke down his approach in that regard, per Tim Keown of ESPN.
“I’ve been doing this for years,” Kerr said. “I took a lot of heat during the pandemic season because I was sticking to my guns and playing Steph 34 minutes a game, giving him about an eight-minute break in each half. And I used a line that became infamous around here when I said, ‘We’re not chasing wins.’ And people were like, ‘Then what the hell are you doing?’ and the answer was, ‘We’re saving Steph. We’re preserving him for his career.’ I probably shouldn’t have said the quiet part out loud, but I’m fine with admitting a big part of my job is not running Steph into the ground.”
Kerr also spoke on why he believes there is still the potential for lightning to strike with this current Warriors team.
“I’m not going to do it,” Kerr said about whether he would increase Curry’s minutes. “For me, it’s more like this: We want to put ourselves in position to give him a chance in the playoffs. We did that when we won the title in ’22; we caught lightning in a bottle and the matchups worked our way and Steph does what Steph does. We want to give him that chance again. We want that at-bat.”
Can the Warriors turn things around?
The Warriors got off to a hot start this year, just as they did in 2023-24. However, that quickly tapered off as the team’s role players started to fall back to Earth, and Curry himself has shown some glimpses of his age, even if he still remains one of the game’s greatest players.
At this point, it would appear that the team’s clearest path toward contention would be swinging another big trade for a player like Jimmy Butler who could truly turn the franchise’s fortunes around.
However, it remains to be seen whether Mike Dunleavy and company are willing to make such a move.
The post What Warriors coach Steve Kerr refuses to do with Stephen Curry appeared first on ClutchPoints.
