Jonathan Kuminga isn’t exactly Steve Kerr’s Game 7 ace-in-the-hole, he’s just an extra card in the deck.
But right now, in the wake of screwing up their shot at ending this first-round series in Friday’s Game 6 at Chase Center, Kerr and the Warriors just need more options, more possibilities, and more chances at conjuring something wild and electric that might change everything.
They need to try Kuminga. Because what they’re doing and most of the players they’re playing suddenly just aren’t working against the Rockets. Because it just might be the right way to avoid the embarrassment of losing the series after taking a 3-1 lead.
Of course, the Warriors can’t realistically put everything on Kuminga to save their season after dropping him from the rotation at the end of the regular season and for most of this series (except the games when Jimmy Butler was hurt). They can’t depend on Kuminga shaking off the rust and turning into their last, desperate solution for Houston’s tricky zone defense. Other Warriors have to carry most of this load.
Hey, Kerr might not play Kuminga at all in Sunday’s do-or-die Game 7 in Houston the same way that he didn’t play Kuminga on Friday, not even in garbage time. There are almost as many reasons to think that Kuminga would make things worse on Sunday as there are indications that he’d improve the Warriors’ chances in such a huge game.
But Kuminga is the most talented player they have left to unveil. He’s played well and aggressively against Houston in the past — he’s the one Warrior who can match the Rockets’ host of high-fliers. And even if he’s not part of any future plans, Game 7 is not the time to prove a point or withhold an intriguing talent.
This is when Kerr and the Warriors have to consider everything. And if they’re doing that, playing Kuminga significant minutes on Sunday has to be at the top of their list of possible adjustments.
“Everything is on the table for Game 7, for sure,” Kerr said after the 115-107 loss on Friday.
Even Kuminga?
“One hundred percent he’s on the table,” Kerr said. “You know this — we’ve kind of found a formula here latter part of the season. We’ve stayed with that formula to start the series. Up 3-1, things are going well. Then obviously last two games have gone very poorly.
“We have to assess everything. Lineup combinations, starters, all of that we have to assess.”
Kerr certainly will consider other options — and any one of them could be more effective than moving Kuminga back into the rotation. It’s practically a Warriors rule that when things get sticky, Kerr and the main veterans want Kevon Looney back in the starting lineup. Maybe that’s the right tweak to fend off Houston’s extremely effective two-center lineup. Or Kerr could give some minutes to Gui Santos or Pat Spencer.
But Kuminga really could solve one specific and large Warriors problem that’s developed late in this series: Finding somebody other than Stephen Curry or Butler to slice into the open parts of the Rockets’ zone and actually put the ball in the basket. At the very least, everybody on the Warriors knows that Kuminga will want to do this — a valuable trait after watching Gary Payton II, Brandin Podziemski, Buddy Hield, Quentin Post, and other Warriors turn down open shots and open lanes over the last few games.
“You can be way too unselfish; you can be way too passive,” Butler said. “I think you got to find a fine line. Yes, obviously if Steph is open, you pass up your shot to get it to him. But when it comes to everybody else, if you find your shot, you’re in rhythm, you take it. If not, it’s simple: pass it to the next open guy, create for somebody else or create for yourself.
“I think sometimes we do a lot of thinking and it doesn’t end well for us.”
The Rockets clearly have set up their defense to dare the Warriors’ secondary players to shoot. In Houston’s blowout victory on Wednesday, the Warriors were so overwhelmed it was tough to work through any possible strategic adjustments. On Friday, it was all there to see. Hield went 0 for 4 and scored 0 points. Payton, put in the lineup to try to stop VanVleet, didn’t do that and also couldn’t exploit the Rockets’ heavy tilt to Curry and Butler. None of the role players looked at all comfortable in this moment. If the Warriors can’t find extra scorers on Sunday, the season will be over.
“Everybody’s in this league for a reason,” Curry said. “If you have a shot, take it. I don’t need to say anything. Coach doesn’t need to say anything. You’re out there, be aggressive. Look for your shot. We’ll live with it. That’s the name of the game. The shots that we’re creating or the shots that are open, keep taking ’em.”
Kuminga was pulled from the rotation because he hasn’t found a way to fit with Butler and because other role players fit better with Curry. And in the minutes he got in Game 2 after Butler’s injury that night and then in Game 3 with Butler out, Kuminga looked mostly hesitant, like he just didn’t want to make the kind of mistake that got him pulled in the first place.
But Kuminga’s natural inclination is to put his head down, beat a defender off the dribble, and get to the basket. It hasn’t worked with the Warriors since Butler’s arrival because the Warriors want things to be more disciplined and spread out, but it’s fairly necessary now. If Kuminga is ready to do that stuff, he could make a difference by being so different.
“Yeah, he cut out for it,” Draymond said. “He cut out for whatever we throw at him. He built right, the right way, for that —1000%.”
I mean, couldn’t two or three Kuminga driving baskets have helped keep the Warriors alive in the fourth quarter on Friday? That’s when the Warriors closed to within two points after three quarters but then just froze offensively and gave up a 15-5 Rockets run — keyed by Payton losing Fred VanVleet in the opening seconds of the quarter then fouling him for a mammoth four-point play — that set up the Houston victory.
And take this beyond Game 7: How far are the Warriors going to go, even if they win on Sunday, if they don’t have one more confident scorer to support Curry and Butler? If they can’t score enough without him, what is there for Kuminga to mess up, anyway?
Kuminga and the Warriors might not have much of a future together, whether he plays great or at all the rest of this postseason, but maybe there’s enough left in this relationship to help put off that breakup for a while longer.