SAN FRANCISCO – Steve Kerr hasn’t yet fully figured out what the Warriors’ rotations will be for the upcoming season, although the veteran coach indicated that he’s getting closer to deciding.
With three days remaining before Golden State opens the 2024-25 season in Portland, Kerr is running out of time to get his plans finalized. He has been doing exactly that as the Warriors make their way through the final few days of practice before things get real Wednesday.
Part of the dilemma facing Kerr is figuring out who to start and who will be the Warriors’ key players coming off the bench.
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That hadn’t been much of an issue in years past when the coach had the luxury of penciling in the core trio of Stephen Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson on a nightly basis. But with Thompson now in Dallas, and the Warriors sporting a roster with names like Kyle Anderson, De’Anthony Melton and Buddy Hield, sorting things out hasn’t been so easy for Kerr and his crew.
A perfect example of that is second-year player Brandin Podziemski, who started two games this preseason but came off the bench in the other games that he played in. At the time Kerr said he liked the idea of Podziemski anchoring the second unit.
Andrew Wiggins is another player who could fit in with the starters fine but has the ability to really stand out with the second unit.
“I have a sense of what I’m going to do but this is the most difficult decision-making I’ve ever had since I’ve been here in terms of who’s playing off the bench,” Kerr said Sunday. “Like I’ve been saying, I’m comfortable playing every single guy in the rotation, and I can’t do that. I’m excited but I’m also not going to feel great on Wednesday when I leave a couple guys out.”
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Kerr said that the Warriors have added to their offense by incorporating some of the methods and ideas that new assistant coach Terry Stotts used when he was the head coach with the Trail Blazers.
Becoming more comfortable and crisper offensively with some of that new stuff while cleaning up things on the defensive side are what the Warriors will try to get done before Wednesday.
“We have to be much sounder defensively,” Kerr said. “We’ve got to continue to work on coverages on certain actions, that we’re going to see consistently. And we’ve got to continue to learn some of the new offensive things that we’re putting in.”