OAKLAND–Steve Kerr has watched the Major League Baseball playoffs closely this year.
He knows when a team is in trouble.
And on Wednesday morning, Kerr admitted he knew the Warriors were in trouble early on in Tuesday evening’s season-opening loss against the Houston Rockets.
Kerr said that because star point guard Steph Curry found himself in early foul trouble, Golden State was forced to switch up its first quarter rotation. Then, other players like Kevin Durant and Jordan Bell found themselves in foul trouble, preventing the Warriors from getting back in sync.
The kicker for Kerr was a late third quarter injury to forward Draymond Green, who usually affords Golden State with the luxury of rolling out a hyper-athletic, smaller lineup late in the fourth quarter to seal up victories. Without Green, and without Andre Iguodala, who sat out with a back issue on Tuesday, the Warriors’ rotation looked like a Major League pitching staff that got blasted early.
“I’m a baseball fan, so I’m watching all the playoffs,” Kerr said. “Last night was like our starter went out with an injury in the second inning and now you’ve got to go to your bullpen early. You can’t get the matchups you want and maybe you’ve already used your set-up man in the fifth inning and you’ve got to bring your closer in early. Everything was out of whack from the beginning so we never really got into the rhythm that we needed.”
The Warriors’ rotations were far different than what Kerr is accustomed to, and as a result, he said he and assistant coach Mike Brown tossed out their pregame plan in the midst of the team’s 122-121 loss to the Rockets on Tuesday. Because Golden State was down so many key assets, Kerr was forced to play big men Kevon Looney and Jordan Bell down the stretch, which actually provided the youngsters with important experience in a critical moment.
“We had a lot of combinations out there last night and obviously some of that was the injury to Andre and the injury to Draymond and we had some combinations that we’ve never even had out there before,” Kerr said. “But that’s good, that’s good for us. Great game for Jordan Bell and Looney to see that kind of action. Patrick McCaw, still a young player, playing down the stretch. It was great and I’m all about the big picture and I’m not too concerned with a lot. I would have preferred to win but it was a good game for us in many ways because we see where we can get better and our young guys got really good experience.”