{"id":100775,"date":"2022-10-18T15:53:15","date_gmt":"2022-10-18T15:53:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/can-the-divided-warriors-still-conquer-this-nba-season\/"},"modified":"2022-10-18T15:53:15","modified_gmt":"2022-10-18T15:53:15","slug":"can-the-divided-warriors-still-conquer-this-nba-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/can-the-divided-warriors-still-conquer-this-nba-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Can the Divided Warriors Still Conquer This NBA Season?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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When Jordan Poole stepped to a podium at the Chase Center in San Francisco over the weekend, hours removed from signing a $140 million contract extension, he knew he first had to address a different matter. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo I’ll start in regards to the Draymond situation,\u201d the Golden State Warriors guard told reporters. \u201cHe apologized. Professional. We plan on handling ourselves that way. We’re going to play basketball and everybody in the locker room and on our team knows what it takes to win the championship, and we’re going to do that on the court. And I mean, that’s really all I have to say on the matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

The statement was the bookend to a weeklong saga that started in the Warriors’ practice facility, a few feet from where Poole spoke. Draymond Green, one of the pillars of Golden State’s multi-title run, punched Poole in the face during a scrimmage, despite little to no provocation. The blow was caught on tape and later leaked to TMZ<\/em>. It fractured a friendship and may have even started the clock on Green’s Bay Area exit. <\/p>\n

The Warriors didn’t suspend Green over the incident. Instead, they issued a fine of an undisclosed amount and allowed him to return to practice last Thursday. For now, as the reigning NBA champions prepare to officially begin their title defense on Tuesday night, the organization is handling the skirmish like it has throughout its near-decade run of prominence: by trusting that its culture can absorb any blows as long as the core of Green, Steph Curry, and Klay Thompson remains intact. <\/p>\n

Along the way to four titles and six Finals appearances, the Warriors have frequently let their players hash out their own disagreements without major punishments. Green lashed out at head coach Steve Kerr at halftime of a 2016 regular-season road matchup against the Thunder, to the point where police considered entering the locker room. But the forward missed no time because of the incident. They even stood by Green when Kevin Durant left the organization months after Green called him out in a vicious verbal attack during a 2018 regular-season game against the Clippers.<\/p>\n

So while pundits and players gave Golden State’s lack of punishment last week\u2014including Bucks veteran Bobby Portis, who served an eight-game, team-issued suspension for punching a teammate when he played for the Bulls in 2017\u2014the Warriors are once again opting to let time heal the wounds. <\/p>\n

\u201cNone of this is comfortable,\u201d Warriors general manager Bob Myers said Sunday. \u201cI would say that we did the best we could, and picked the decision that we thought was the best for the organization. As far as it being easy or comfortable, it wasn’t, it isn’t. The work now has to be forward. That’s all we can do at this point. The decision’s been made and I think the players, the coaches, and the organization has been through it, and I think we’ll be OK.\u201d<\/p>\n

The task of mitigating the tension instead has been delegated to the players in the locker room. Among the vital voices has been center Kevon Looney, whom Kerr recently called the team’s \u201cmoral compass.\u201d Looney, who was drafted by the Warriors in 2015, has been present for all but one of Golden State’s Finals runs and a vital part of three. As such, he holds the unique distinction as a player who’s gained the respect of Golden State’s veteran leadership while also being young enough to relate to the team’s younger players. Also, like Poole, he’s a native of Milwaukee, and an eager listener should Poole have complaints. <\/p>\n

\u201cFor [Poole] it’s hard, because you can’t tell somebody how to feel or tell nobody what to do in a situation like that,\u201d Looney told me recently. \u201cYou have to let guys figure it out on their own. You just have to want to be there for them and let him vent to you, just be a support for him. And let him get through his thoughts himself, and make sure he feels good about basketball and off the court. And try to be there for him. We don’t even talk about it. You just want to be a friend.\u201d <\/p>\n

While unconventional, it’s an approach Golden State’s coach hopes will work. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think the more time we get away from the things, the better,\u201d Kerr told me last week, just before Green played in the Warriors’ preseason finale. \u201cWe had our conversations about what we needed to do moving forward and we’re going to do that. We’re not going to continue to hold on to the past. Doesn’t mean people don’t have feelings towards what happened or a situation, but we do all have goals, individual goals, team goals, and we understand what needs to be done in order to reach those and that’s our focus.\u201d <\/p>\n

The problem is that some individual goals have collided. As the Warriors convened for training camp, several key players were up for extensions, including Poole and Green. Poole was expected to come to an agreement before Monday’s deadline for rookie extensions, and ultimately agreed to a new four-year pact over the weekend. Andrew Wiggins, a key player in the 2022 title run, also signed a four-year, $109 million extension. But with the Warriors’ tax bill climbing to historic levels\u2014current estimates have their payroll at nearly half a billion next season<\/a>\u2014Green was unlikely to get a new deal. Even before the punch, the divide between the future and the past was hard to ignore.<\/p>\n

Most accounts suggest that Green’s attack on Poole was unrelated to the contract situations, that he came into the facility in a bad mood. \u201cThe day that that took place, I was in a very, very, very bad space mentally dealing with some things in my personal life,\u201d Green said. However, after his run-in with Poole, it’s possible he won’t last in Golden State beyond this season, with a player option for the 2023-24 season awaiting him this summer.<\/p>\n

Until then, Green has to find a way to mend fences with the Warriors’ younger core. While Green can be tough on teammates, he had become a mentor for many of Golden State’s young players in recent years. When Janet Jackson made a tour stop at the Chase Center in 2019, Green invited the youngsters to his suite. \u201cThat’s been my guy,\u201d second-year guard Moses Moody said last week. \u201cI can go over there talking to him, talk to him about anything, go to his house. So I feel like he has a real strong relationship with me. I don’t know about anybody else, can’t speak for anybody else, but for me, I don’t see how it could be any stronger.\u201d <\/p>\n

And when young’uns like James Wiseman struggled with injuries and inconsistency, Green would provide reassurance that everything would work itself out. \u201cHe told me a lot of stuff on what I need to work on,\u201d Wiseman told me last season. \u201cBut him just telling me that stuff, and me going through my ups and downs, in terms of my experience my first year, really helped me out a lot. In terms of, as a basketball player, in terms of, mentally. Everything, like knowing the game, reading the game, and stuff like this. He taught me a lot of stuff.\u201d <\/p>\n

But Green’s closest relationship among the young core was with Poole. The duo had grown close since the Warriors drafted Poole with the 28th pick in 2019. When veterans complained about Poole’s arrogance, Green had his back. And when Poole struggled to find his footing in the league while Curry and Thompson battled injuries, Green reassured him that he would figure things out. \u201cHe was pretty accepting. He was willing to take me under his wing, \u201dPoole told me last fall. \u201cI want to say Steph was injured and Klay was out, so out of the Big Three, Draymond was the person I was around the most. And his locker was next to mine. So, as small as that is, it’s kind of a big deal to come see him every day. Even on the road, he’d tell me to come to his room, and I essentially was his rookie. So, we kind of spent a lot of time together my first two years.\u201d <\/p>\n

When Poole toiled in the G League, Green made a point to check in with the young guard. During a matchup against G League Ignite in 2021, Poole traded verbal jabs at then-Ignite coach Brian Shaw. The exchange was so surprising that Shaw called Golden State’s front office to share his concerns about the young guard’s behavior. By the end of the evening, Kris Weems, then the head coach of the Santa Cruz Warriors, received a few calls and a voicemail from a number he didn’t recognize. After a few minutes, a text from the unknown number revealed its sender: \u201cYo, it’s DG,\u201d it read. \u201cWhat’s up with JP?\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s really a big brother\u2013little brother relationship,\u201d Poole told me last fall. \u201cSometimes it can turn into like a mentor\u2013mentee situation with some players, but for Draymond, it was just like, he’s big bro and I’m little bro. He went to Michigan State, I went to Michigan, so he’ll use that card slightly, but I think we just kind of had the same sort of background, the same type of hunger, the same motivation, and obviously being African American men in today’s society. [When he gets] the chance that he gets to really kind of put knowledge on somebody, to kind of put somebody on game, he will.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the punch divided them. Following the incident, some within Poole’s circle didn’t want him to sign the extension because the team dynamics would be too difficult to repair. Before Green was reinstated, team officials approached Poole with the decision and asked him to sign off on it.<\/p>\n

Over the weekend, Poole was asked whether his brotherhood with Green still exists. \u201cIf I said it, I meant it,\u201d he replied. \u201cLike I said, we’re here to play basketball, and our teammates and coaching staff and the organization, everybody knows what it takes to win a championship. And when we get out there on that court, we all have one common goal. Get the job done, win as many games as we can, and try to repeat.\u201d <\/p>\n

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