Chris Paul already sounds cranky at idea of coming off Warriors' bench
The Point God appears to be bristling at being demoted to a lesser deity.
When the Warriors traded for Chris Paul, his role seemed clear: replace Jordan Poole as the leader of the second unit and Steph Curry’s backup. The Warriors have plenty of guards in their starting lineup; the major problem that Paul-for-Poole seemed to address was a lack of stability and creation off the bench.
It may not be so simple yet.
Last month, a report trickled out that Paul could slot in the starting lineup alongside Steph Curry and Klay Thompson. On Sunday, Paul spoke with local media at summer league in Las Vegas, and it seems clear that he hasn’t quite embraced a bench role yet.
Asked about possibly playing with the second unit, Paul got a little snippy. “You coaching?” he asked the reporter who brought up his fit with the Dubs’ bench players. “I don’t know what the situation is going to be yet,” Paul said. “So I think that will be for us to figure out once we get going.” Paul responded to a follow-up asking whether he was willing to come off the bench by saying that he and Steve Kerr would hash it out in training camp.
Reporters who were there detected the energy behind the exchange. “Doesn’t sound like he expects to come off the bench,” The Athletic’s Marcus Thompson said. “Chris Paul doesn’t seem to love the idea of coming off the bench,” the San Francisco Chronicle’s Connor Letourneau said. (The Chronicle and SFGATE are both owned by Hearst but have separate newsrooms.)
On some level, this isn’t that surprising. Paul has started every single one of his 1,214 regular season games since entering the NBA in 2005. But as we wrote last month, Paul in the starting lineup makes no sense for a million or so reasons. A three-guard lineup with Paul, Curry and Thompson would be short on defense and literally just short. Paul’s grindingly slow playing style fits far better as the leader of a separate unit than with the speedy motion offense run by Curry, Thompson and Draymond Green. ESPN wrote on Sunday evening that Golden State “wanted to acquire a player they could trust to run their second unit.”
This Warriors training camp might not have the spectacular drama of a player getting punched in the face. But it might not be completely free of drama either.
Source: SFGATE
