Why Warriors' Steve Kerr values Jonathan Kuminga's 'force and power' on bench

11/06/2024 02:41 PM

Jonathan Kuminga for Sixth Man of the Year? He’s certainly proven worthy of winning that individual hardware since moving to the bench over the last four games.

Now seemingly entrenched in a role he’s never wanted but has paid major dividends for both player and team in the season’s early going, expect the Golden State Warriors forward to cement himself as one of basketball’s most impactful reserves.

Steve Kerr addressed Kuminga’s status in the rotation during a Tuesday appearance on 95.7 The Game, clarifying he would keep coming off the bench going forward.

"It's a huge factor for JK to give us what he's giving. Again, everything is about the puzzle fitting. Everything is about putting together five-man combinations, and we need JK's force and power. Frankly, we need it more off the bench than we do in the starting lineup,” he told “Willard & Dibs.”

Kerr on Kuminga continuing to come off the bench pic.twitter.com/xthJz68VeO

— 95.7 The Game (@957thegame) November 6, 2024

“I love what I'm seeing. He's handling it great. He obviously wants to start, everybody wants to start, but that hasn't impacted his effort or energy at all. In fact, I think he's looked even better since we've brought him off the bench,” Kerr continued. “I think it suits him well with this team. Until things change, we'll keep going with this, but I love what we're seeing from JK."

The Draymond Green factor behind Jonathan Kuminga’s shift to bench

Just because Kuminga is out of the starting lineup doesn’t mean he’ll revert back to playing power forward full-time this season. Maybe the deepest team in the league, the Warriors are still much better stocked with wings and bigs than backcourt ball-handlers.

It would make sense for them to occasionally deploy bigger lineups with Kuminga at the three in 2024-25 even irrespective of his longstanding public preference to play on the perimeter. Big picture, letting the 22-year-old endure inevitable growing pains of that positional and stylistic change would undoubtedly be beneficial for both parties.

But the Dubs didn’t sign Kuminga to the near-max contract he demanded in extension talks, and suddenly look like second-tier contenders at worst in a wild Western Conference. They’re hoping for another puncher’s chance at a title right now, not two or three years down the line when Stephen Curry is approaching 40 and Kuminga may have garnered the reps, experience and additional ball skills needed to thrive playing small forward.

Draymond Green’s presence is even more instructive than Curry’s here. Kerr spoke in the preseason of the need to limit his time playing small-ball five, a stance Green echoed while simultaneously advocating for Kuminga’s natural bonafides at the three.

There haven’t been many smarter players throughout NBA history than Green. He surely knows just how clunky Golden State’s halfcourt offense has been so far while sharing the floor with Kuminga and another big, no surprise given this team’s lack of floor-spacers up front and the latter’s increasing desire to sop up usage with the ball in his hands.

The Warriors sport a ho-hum offensive rating of 112.6 with the initial starting trio of Kuminga, Green and Jackson-Davis on the floor, per pbpstats.com, failing to compensate for that mediocrity with elite defense en route to a -8.7 net rating. The downsized frontcourt of Kuminga and Green, meanwhile, boasts a gaudy offensive rating of 136.8 while racking up a +23.9 net rating. What about the tandem of Green and Jackson-Davis, with Kuminga on the bench? A +36.9 net rating across 59 minutes, utterly dominating both sides of the ball.

Sample sizes are still very small this early in the season. Just because the Dubs have basically done away with playing Kuminga alongside Green and a traditional center doesn’t mean he’s been relegated back to power forward exclusively. He’ll still get ample opportunities initiating action as an offensive focal point in bench-heavy lineups with Kyle Anderson and Kevon Looney. Kuminga’s usage even stands to trend up in small-ball outfits featuring Curry, at least if the pointed yet patient “force and power” he’s shown with the ball of late becomes the new game-by-game norm.

This latest personal disappointment has more to do with the Warriors at large than Kuminga individually. Green’s presence will be an obstacle to his desired role as a full-fledged starter until Kuminga manages the all-around skill and feel required to be his best on the wing—varied, nuanced development that may never come.

In the meantime, with the specter of Kuminga’s restricted free agency looming next summer, at least Golden State still has its ace in the hole of small-ball readily available for nightly rotation stints and specific circumstances of time, score and opponent. Just don’t expect to see Kuminga and Green manning the frontcourt as starters again this season until the playoffs.

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