At least for a day, things seem patched up.
Thursday night, Jonathan Kuminga thought he played well — 16 points on 5-of-7 shooting — but he sat on the bench the final 18 minutes of a game where the Warriors fell apart in the fourth quarter and lost to the Nuggets. After the game came a report that Kuminga had “lost faith” in his ability to develop under Steve Kerr, echoing concerns of other young players that they had been jerked around in the rotation and underutilized on a struggling team.
In the 20 hours before the Warriors retook the court against the Pistons — the team to play when you need a feel-good win — Kerr and Kuminga talked. Here is how Kuminga described the situation, courtesy of Michael Wagaman at NBC Sports Bay Area.
“I think it went really well,” Kuminga said. “It was just all about a better understanding of each other and more communication. Just us having that conversation today made me comfortable and made him more comfortable...
“I never complained about playing time or things like that,” Kuminga said. “We were just talking about if I do great at something, I should just go back and remind him and let him know, ‘Coach, what do I I need to get better at?’ It’s more about communication and better understanding from both of us.”
Not so coincidentally, Kuminga played a season-high 36 minutes in the Warriors win over Detroit, with 11 points and six rebounds.
“I thought he played well tonight,” Kerr said postgame. “And he’s a young guy and he wants to play. I just told him everybody wants to play and we’ve got a lot of guys who can play. So every night is going to be a little different. (Tonight) I thought he moved the ball. He guarded both (Cade) Cunningham and (Bojan) Bogdanovich and he played good.”
Kerr’s challenge is this: Kuminga and Andrew Wiggins are the team’s best two-way wings, but they don’t play well together — the team has a -16.4 net rating in the minutes Kuming and Wiggins shared the court this season. That leaves Kerr scrambling to find rotations that work, especially with Draymond Green still away from the team on suspension and now Chris Paul out for an extended period of time with a fractured hand. Wiggins has struggled this season to the point that Kuminga has taken over his starting job, but nightly Kerr tries to ride the hot hand.
The backdrop to this — and for guard Moses Moody, who has been out of the rotation but will get minutes with CP3 out — is that they are extension eligible after this season. They are in contract years and understandably want to showcase what they can do and up their value. Kerr and the Warriors are still trying to win now and extend the Stephen Curry era (even if from the outside it looks over). Win now and developing/showcasing young players is a tricky line to walk, and it’s fair to question how well Kerr did on it.
If the Warriors make the postseason, they will need a lot more Kuminga (and a lot more Moody) — he will get his chance. Considering the rest of the Warriors’ current roster, Kerr needs to lean into youth and energy.
