The Golden State Warriors won the game against the Phoenix Suns with 46 points. However, the headlines were made above all by the fact that Steve Kerr left coaching to his players. Not all of the opponents were happy about it.
Such a regular season can be pretty damn long, especially if the ticket for the postseason is already booked and you have been to the finals three times in a row. A home game against the Phoenix Suns, who are stuck in the mud of the Western Conference and also play without their best player (Devin Booker), can be taken lightly.
So coach Steve Kerr came up with something special. In the middle of the first quarter, the two-time master trainer pressed the clipboard and marker into his veteran Andre Iguodala’s hand and let him do the forward. Kerr and his assistants withdrew and preferred to watch the video cube.
“I already told the team on Saturday that we would do this,”Kerr told them after the match. This is certainly not usually the case. Of course, some of the players (especially the superstars) decide which plays are to be played, but the fact that the coach takes full responsibility has obviously not yet existed.
“The team belongs to the players,”Kerr went on to say,”That’s something you have to keep in mind as a coach. It’s not mine, it doesn’t belong to GM Bob Myers and it doesn’t belong to owner Joe Lacob, even though I won’t tell him so,” The mood seems to be better for the champion again, after the team showed some signs of wear and tear and lost three out of four games (Jazz, Nuggets, Thuner) in the meantime.
“I haven’t reached my players in the last month. My voice has bored her, even I’m bored with my own voice” It had crept in sloppiness. In January, the Dubs achieved a defensive rating of 109.6 (26th place) and thus made the Cavs company in the swamp.
Coach Kerr wanted to set a new impetus through his action:”My job is to get the team on the right track, I don’t have to control it. We weren’t really focused last month, so I think it was the right move.”
As Jared Dudley confirmed to ESPN:”It shows the lack of respect for the opponent”, but it also limited:”Maybe we don’t deserve the respect either. If you’re beaten by 40 points, teams won’t respect you. We have to change that.”
Kerr refused to accept this.”This had nothing to do with lack of respect. I just wanted to reach my team,”Sun coach Jay Triano wasn’t angry either and added ironically,” I noticed that their plays were much more creative after time out.