Stephen Curry is hurt. Steve Kerr is not happy.
Curry underwent postgame MRIs on what was deemed a sore left foot. He was hurt in the play below, in which the Celtics’ Marcus Smart dove after a loose ball and Curry was caught in the crossfire.
He came up limping and promptly headed into the locker room. Curry, and Moses Moody, who sustained a right shoulder injury, did not return in the second half.
Kerr was seen yelling as Smart, appearing to say, “Hey man, no! You just hurt him! You hurt him!”
Here’s another clip of him talking to Smart during the game:
After the game, Kerr doubled down, saying it was a “dangerous play.”
He said he spoke to Smart one-on-one after the game. Kerr recalled coaching Smart for USA Basketball at the World Cup a few years back and expressed respect for him.
“I thought it was a dangerous play. I thought Marcus dove into Steph’s knee and that’s what I was upset about.” Kerr said. “Lot of respect for Marcus… We talked after the game. We’re good, but I thought it was a dangerous play and just let him know.”
Celtics Head Coach Ime Udoka threw some salt in the wound, implying that Kerr and the Warriors were complaining unnecessarily. He said that’s a good sign for Boston.
Juan Toscano-Anderson didn’t share Kerr’s feelings, either. As a player who made his living largely with grit and playing high-energy basketball, he said he understood that Smart was just playing hard.
He likened that to when he injured his head jumping over the scorer’s table. When you’re in the heat of the moment and play hard, it’s tough to process every possible risk factor.
“I think Marcus Smart just wanted the ball,” Toscano-Anderson said. “I don’t think it was a dirty play. He could have probably been a little more cautious, but when you play that hard, and all you know is to do that, it’s kind of like me diving over the scoreboard for the ball.
“If I had time to think about it, I probably wouldn’t do it, but it’s just a natural instinct. We all know that’s Marcus Smart though. That’s how he plays. He plays gritty, 50-50 balls. I think there was a statistic we talked about prior to the game that they’re like number four in the league in getting 50-50 balls so unfortunately, Steph was a casualty of that. But that’s part of the game, right?”
Draymond Green was somewhere in the middle, saying that it could possibly be deemed unnecessary, but that he couldn’t deem it a “dirty play.”
There is currently no indication of the severity of Curry’s injury, but Green said the fact that he left the game an underwent MRIs suggests he will not play this Sunday. Green expects he may have to start if that is indeed the case.
