The Steve Kerr/Stephen Curry Crunchtime Conundrum
Steve Kerr is one of the smartest, nicest, and genuinely good person and coach in the league. Just last year, I’d have very little issue positing that he was the best mind in the entire NBA. Unlocking the trio of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green, Kerr pushed this team from the capped-out Mark Jackson Golden State Warriors into a champion and one of the greatest units of all time. Behind a defense that got even better with a switching scheme and an offense that maximized everyone’s ability, Kerr transformed into a superstar himself.
Now coming off the greatest choke job in NBA history and another late-game defeat to the Cleveland Cavaliers, it’s a good enough time to bring up the issues the Warriors have had simmering under the beautiful surface all season: crunchtime offense. Forget rim protection, defensive rebounding, and depth. All of those are remedied by either Kevin Durant or simply the massive talent edge they own on opponents, even the Cavs.
It is important to note, however, that despite the fatal flaws the Warriors have, they were still up 14 with 8 minutes left in the game after outplaying the Cavs the entire way through. But there’s a reason why all sports term the last 5 minutes crunchtime and in those 5 minutes, the KD-infused Warriors were soundly outplayed in almost a mirror image of what happened last June. With Kyrie Irving, of all people, stealing passes and the entire GSW small ball lineup muffled and milling around the perimeter clueless, it exposed the lack of a Cavs-specific game plan.
With a great mind comes great responsibility, is what people tend to say on the Internet, I think. The Cavs are taking the tunnel vision route with their gameplan. They have LeBron James and Kyrie Irving and are willing to put their entire playbook in their hands without worrying about depth. Come the postseason, depth just doesn’t matter as much and they know it. There’s no cute or beautiful way to run their offense. They try to switch Steph onto the ballhandler and proceed to isolation the Warriors to death…
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