- 7 weeks ago
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00:00The Golden State Warriors off to just a jammin' start.
00:03They win in L.A. by double digits.
00:06I wouldn't call it a blowout, but a game they controlled from the beginning to the end.
00:11And I thought that you could just sprinkle all kinds of things that are pretty exciting to see.
00:17I don't want to get too far into, like, shooting percentages and stuff, because it's like one game.
00:22But I look at it more in terms of, like, okay, what are the Warriors offering?
00:27And I think that last night is a reminder that this team has two superstars.
00:33And I really do think that we've forgotten this.
00:36We really have forgotten it.
00:38Everybody through the offseason got stuck on two things.
00:41One was obvious, all of the drama and the negotiations surrounding Jonathan Kaminga.
00:46And two, the Warrior age.
00:48The age is what it is, and that'll play out over time, and they're going to have to manage it and have a plan and all that.
00:54What I think has really been under-discussed is how much talent is on this team.
00:59You have two legit superstars.
01:03And then there's a bunch of the question marks that get thrown in, such as can Jonathan and the team meet in the middle
01:11and find that stride of playing the way they want him to play.
01:15Last night was a wonderful start.
01:17I was reminded of the way Buddy Heald started last year, where he was absolutely on fire.
01:24Happened again.
01:25I find the Warriors to be damn near unbeatable when Buddy Heald shoots the ball like that.
01:30And then, okay, Dibs, your guy, Will Richard, was a real positive.
01:37Obviously, in just little sprinkles out there on the court.
01:40But he looks like he's advertised, which is a player that comes out of college with a lot of basketball experience
01:47and therefore just brings smarts to the court and some ability right away.
01:52And your plus-minus army out there, he was a minus 11.
01:56So if you want to go ahead.
01:57Yeah.
01:57Yeah, whatever.
01:58Yeah, minus 11.
01:59I mean, he had a couple of great plays.
02:01He had a great steal.
02:02He had a catch-and-shoot bucket where it was an air ball, and he was there.
02:06I just thought that watching him, he looked like somebody who belonged.
02:10He didn't ever have that feeling of like, oh, boy, this is too big for me.
02:15It's the opening night.
02:16It's primetime.
02:17I'm on Peacock.
02:18Now I'm on NBC.
02:20I've never been on NBC before.
02:22No one ever has in our career.
02:24He just looked like a guy who belonged.
02:26And, you know, Steve Kerr obviously liked him enough to play him 13 and a half minutes more than GP2.
02:31So I do think that he's going to get more minutes and more of a chance to go out there and show himself.
02:37But for me, the biggest part is what you're talking about, where it's Jimmy Butler.
02:41Whether or not you have two stars or not, Steph Curry was able to kind of just like, not Netflix and chill,
02:48but, all right, Steph, we need you to come here and kind of save us with the big three.
02:51Okay, boom, big three.
02:54We're up 10.
02:55Night-night.
02:55Game over.
02:56But by and large, it was kind of Jimmy carrying the water all night.
02:59It absolutely was, and then he was, along with Draymond, the ones who had to be entered back into the game late.
03:05I think Steve was hoping to put the whole thing on ice.
03:09Lakers made a little bit of run.
03:10Happens in the NBA, whatever.
03:13Okay, Draymond, Jimmy, go back in there.
03:15And the second they did, they put a stop to it right away.
03:18Draymond with that corner three, I thought kind of was like what restabilized the whole thing,
03:23and it was just kind of cruise control from there.
03:26Take a listen to a lot of this, though.
03:27Because, honestly, I don't know what your number one takeaway was.
03:31My number one takeaway, and maybe this sounds like a stupid media thing to say,
03:36but I was actually so impressed with everything that happened after the game.
03:44The game itself was great.
03:45The Warriors played, I think, a team that they're better than, and they won.
03:49It was sloppy at times, but whatever.
03:52However, they led by, I think, led by Kaminga and their main stars at the start of the third quarter.
03:59They were fantastic, and they took a one-point lead and knocked it to double digits right away,
04:04and then it pretty much stayed there.
04:06I thought that was where they won the game.
04:07But what I loved is what I heard after the game.
04:13And I know these are just words, but to me it spoke to an overall connectivity to where this team is right now,
04:23and I think that's what we spent most of the summer actually worrying about,
04:27which is how, through all of this, do you find a way on opening night to be on the same page?
04:33Jonathan wants to be a one.
04:35He's going to be mad at the way this all went.
04:37How do you find that sort of peaceful existence where everybody,
04:44because I'm a firm believer in this, on the team needs to be pushing in the same direction?
04:48Didn't you feel like you heard that?
04:50And I felt it genuine.
04:53I mean, here's Jonathan on rebounding.
04:57The rebound part, it's just been a goal that I've been speaking to my people.
05:00Just myself, I was trying to set a goal and just be a rebounder as much as I can.
05:05No matter how my game is going on offense and defense,
05:07just making sure, just impacting on that side of the game, just being a great rebounder.
05:13And I'll say assist-wise, it's just the game has slowed down so much.
05:16Just things I'm reading way better compared to, you know, before or my past.
05:20So, you know, just letting the game come to me easily.
05:22Not trying to force a lot of things and just reading how people playing against me,
05:26or, you know, how we're moving on the court with different people on the floor,
05:30with Steph, with Jimmy, Draymond, everybody.
05:33Just pretty much everybody on the team and learning how they're moving.
05:36And I think it's one of the things I kind of went to over summertime, watching a lot of films.
05:42Just working on playing without the ball, with the ball, losing certain people as Jimmy, Steph.
05:46Just focusing on how to play with those people and just working on my own basketball pace.
05:52And I think that's kind of helped me throughout the summer.
05:54That's why helping me out there to just see the game even better.
05:57Jonathan is not in the Yoda space.
05:59You know the famous quote from Yoda,
06:01there is no try, do or do not.
06:04We're not there yet.
06:05I think that's part of it.
06:07It's professional sports.
06:08You can't go out there and just be like, but I'm trying.
06:11But I think that that's at least step one, isn't it?
06:14Step one is to both hear and see Jonathan say the things and do the things that the organization wanted him to do.
06:24And I felt in the first half, you could see the effort.
06:28You're still making some mistakes as far as decisions and shot selection.
06:32And then in the second half, you saw someone who nailed it.
06:36He absolutely nailed it.
06:38That's step one as far as the Warriors having another high-level weapon, I think.
06:44One, I do believe that if he is your number four weapon, to use your word,
06:49then you have a chance to really be something special because last night he had nine rebounds.
06:54And last year he only had four games where he got nine rebounds.
06:57And I do want to tip the cap to his agent, Aaron Turner,
07:00for the most awkward statement of his hour-long interview with Steining Guru,
07:04which was, you know, if he gets the minutes, he's going to rebound.
07:08And so far, through one game, he's not wrong.
07:11He got the minutes, and he did rebound.
07:13I'm going to package it that way.
07:15I'm going to do it because Kaminga got the minutes, and he got the rebounds.
07:20And I do think that whether or not it was the minutes that he got,
07:23he definitely looked engaged from the jump, and he got the start, and he got the minutes.
07:29And even though in his opening eight or nine minutes, it was a little bit sloppy.
07:34They all were sloppy.
07:36And he had a couple of shots that you probably don't really want him to take.
07:40But it's the first quarter of game one, so go out there and, you know, try to get your way into it.
07:45He had one that he got into the key, and he spun, and he pulled up from 13,
07:49and he was double-teamed, and it was just an absolute brick.
07:52But other than that, I thought that he was mostly good.
07:55And his two turnovers in the first half, one was when he saved the ball under the Lakers' basket,
08:01and he had to throw it to somebody, and he threw it to the Lakers.
08:04That's a turnover.
08:05And the other one was where he got an offense rebound, and he was double-teamed under the basket,
08:09and he was not strong enough, and he just straight lost it.
08:12Those were his two turnovers.
08:13They weren't like, I'm in here, and I leave my feet, and I have nowhere to go to.
08:17They were, I think, for me anyway, normal, aggressive-type turnovers that you can live with.
08:23Grandy, you said you got a tweet from his agent last night?
08:26Yeah, Aaron Turner, at AROCKTurner20, right as the game ended, tweeted,
08:30Trust the work!
08:31Two exclamation points.
08:33Okay.
08:34That's not a bothersome thing to say.
08:37Oh, he's about to get a follow for me.
08:39Oh, God.
08:40Yeah, trust the work, AROCK.
08:42Let him know that he's going to get muted six days later, because that's how you operate.
08:46I don't work with him, so he won't be muted.
08:48He will be.
08:49If he tweets too much, he will be.
08:50We'll see.
08:51Yeah, as long as that, like, I don't mind any of that.
08:54That's, like, what I wouldn't, when you told me there was a tweet, and you wanted to read it,
08:59I was like, this better not sound like I told you so.
09:02There better not be any I told you so in this tweet.
09:04Minutes equal rebounds.
09:06Hashtag, let JK eat.
09:08Like, that would bother you more than, you know.
09:11He also retweeted one of Anthony Slater's tweets last night,
09:14talking about Draymond complimenting Kaminga in his play.
09:18I think we have that right here, do we not?
09:21His performance was great.
09:23That rebound is what everyone in the world has been waiting to see.
09:28You know, you got that athleticism.
09:31You go make big plays like that.
09:32You got superstar potential.
09:34You go make big plays.
09:36Those are game-winning plays.
09:38What did we get, two free throws out of that?
09:40Like, those are game-winning plays.
09:43You know, and so, you know, we all can ask for opportunity.
09:46When you ask for opportunity, you must deliver.
09:48I think he's been very vocal about his opportunity, and he delivered.
09:52And so, you know, when you see a guy that's willing to put their neck on the line
09:58and be vocal, and then they deliver, you also must reward them.
10:02Because if they don't, you tear them down.
10:04That's just naturally what happens.
10:06If you be vocal and you don't deliver, you get torn down.
10:09So, when you're vocal and you go deliver the way he did all night,
10:13he was guarding Luke all night.
10:14You know what that just made me think of?
10:16Don't even say it.
10:17Say it for me.
10:17Because I thought the same thing.
10:18Say it for me.
10:19Andrew Wiggins.
10:20No.
10:20In the playoffs.
10:21No.
10:22Debo Samuel Thursday night against the Rams last year.
10:25Oh, wow.
10:26Vocal about opportunity, and then you don't deliver, you're going to get torn down.
10:31I was thinking about Andrew Wiggins when he had double-digit rebounds in the playoffs,
10:35and they all said, man, did you see that?
10:37That rebounds.
10:38Andrew, I mean, that's what Andrew can do.
10:40That's what I heard from the beginning of the Draymond quote right there.
10:44Well, I would love what I saw from Jonathan last night in the second half.
10:48I would love for that to be labeled cooking.
10:52Can we do that?
10:54That is cooking.
10:55The whole let J.K. cook thing is, I think, emblematic of the wrong way to play basketball.
11:05Let J.K. have the ball in the wing and then let him shake it.
11:09And then just shake it back.
11:10And then we're going to go to the rack and then we're going to ha.
11:13Like, that's not basketball.
11:14That's not winning basketball.
11:16I, like, man, he was good in the second half last night.
11:21Good Lord, because the whole thing, all of them, was within the framework of what the team was trying to do.
11:29And it leads to easy buckets.
11:31And you hear Draymond.
11:32Like, Draymond's fired up about a rebound.
11:35He's not fired up about 17 points.
11:37He's fired up about a rebound because it's a winning play.
11:41And Jonathan is doing it, man.
11:43So I don't know.
11:44Like, it's one night.
11:46But on one night, didn't you go to bed last night and feel like, I think they all got to each other?
11:52I think somebody heard somebody.
11:54And that's all the whole thing has been waiting for, right?
11:58Yeah, basically.
11:59And you heard Jimmy Butler talk about how, you know, he and J.K. have spent time and how he's going to mentor him and all the rest of it.
12:06And if that's really the way that's going to go, if he did what he did in the summer and he gets his deal and then he missed out on Jimmy Butler's San Diego wine cellar vibe and all the rest of it.
12:17But that's okay.
12:18You get all into camp and Jimmy goes, hey, J.K., come here.
12:21Let me tell you what I think you should do.
12:24And that's it.
12:25Jimmy Butler last night.
12:26I just want to help J.K. be great.
12:30He's got so much, like, just raw talent.
12:33And he's so aggressive.
12:34He's athletic.
12:35He's super smart.
12:36And I'm trying to teach him a little bit of what I see throughout the game.
12:40And we've been, you know, kicking it, hanging out, watching film, and just working on our game together after practice, before practice, during practice.
12:48I just, I know how great he wants to be and how great he can be.
12:52So it's now my job to help him fulfill that.
12:55And that's where I got to admit that I was wrong this summer when I was worried about the ability for these guys to all wrap each other up in a sleeping bag.
13:05And, like, be okay.
13:06Go camping together, man.
13:07Like, just let the whole thing get wrapped up into the warrior culture.
13:11We're one night in, but I'm hearing all the things you would hope to hear from Jonathan, from Steve, from Jimmy, from Draymond.
13:21And then you also get a sprinkle in of all the light stuff.
13:24Buddy hates Jimmy.
13:26Yep.
13:26Jimmy's betting on himself against Steph.
13:29I like that.
13:30Steph doesn't even know that the bet's happening.
13:31The bet's with Draymond.
13:33Jimmy and Steph both go out.
13:34If you didn't hear, by the way, Jimmy has a bet with Draymond that he can have a higher percentage from the free throw line this year than Steph.
13:41Steph catches wind of it, says there's no chance he's going to win that.
13:44They're both shooting 100% after last night.
13:47Yep.
13:47Like, that's what you want.
13:52How easy is it to root for that group?
13:55It's easy.
13:56And Jimmy kind of made a guru bet because the better bet would have been, I'm going to make more free throws than you.
14:02Because he's not going to have a higher percentage than Steph.
14:04Jimmy shoots about 84%, but Jimmy's going to get more shot attempts from the foul line.
14:09That's true.
14:10The better bet would be, I'm going to make more than you, Steph Curry.
14:14That's a real bet.
14:15No, you let him know.
14:17Maybe there's still time to adjust it.
14:19Yeah.
14:19That's going to be up to Day Day.
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