Relatively important long-range information: The Warriors are not "hard-capped" now, even though they're over the $125M luxury-tax apron and they're not likely to be hard-capped next July, either.

Which means that the Warriors still are in good shape to re-sign Patrick McCaw next year when he becomes a restricted free agent because they will still be protected by the Gilbert Arenas Rule regarding second-round picks who become RFAs.

You lose that protection if you're hard-capped.

Got all that? I study this stuff, I write about this stuff, and that part still is confusing to me, and when I'm confused I often turn to The Athletic's Danny Leroux, who is, among many other things, a salary-cap expert and somebody who is always helpful when I check with him.

Danny writes a lot of smart things on many aspects of the NBA, he's covering the Summer League now, and he was kind enough to call in for this episode, recorded yesterday.

Obviously we talked about Kevin Durant's gesture of reducing his salary for next season all the way down to about $25M (his max is over $34M and the max he could've received from the Warriors while still giving them flexibility was $31.8M).

And we talked about many other situations throughout the league.

But one of the main things I wanted to figure out was the situation with McCaw heading into next year, since we know that he's a very important part of the Warriors' future -- basically, to help fill the roles of Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston when they need rest and maybe if they start to really slow down over the next few years.

Danny provided the answer, clearly and thoughtfully, and that's not a surprise at all.

The post TK Show: NBA analyst Danny Leroux on the Warriors' salary-cap maneuverings and more appeared first on Talking Points.

OAKLAND--Let's just say it: You're not going to get more and better details about the Warriors' contract negotiations and surprises than this conversation right here with GM Bob Myers.

For instance, Myers details exactly when and how Kevin Durant and his agent approached Warriors management with the idea of taking about $25M this season -- less than his true max salary and $6.8M less than even the number he could've made to keep the Warriors' payroll flexibility -- and what his own reaction to it was.

And Myers explains what that meant for the rest of the free-agent period, especially for re-signing Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston and even to using more money to sign Nick Young.

Durant's give-back was the key to the whole thing because it was made with a sense for the Warriors' true tax-paying budget.

The Warriors are way, way over the luxury-tax line, but there's a limit to how far Joe Lacob was going to go over (they're going to end up paying about $185M in combined salary and tax this season), and Durant realized this, Myers said.

Durant did it, Myers said, specifically to free up money for Iguodala and Livingston and Myers said it's pretty certain that one or both of them would've been gone if Durant had not done this.

Myers also explained the give-and-take of the long talks to bring Iguodala back, what Lacob's mentality was, and why the Warriors (and his teammates) felt it was so important to bring him back.

There's a lot of detail to this and to what it says about the Warriors' mentality -- in ownership, management and throughout the locker room -- and it flowed through the entire free-agent period.

The post Warriors Plus Minus: GM Bob Myers play-by-play on Kevin Durant's give-back, the Iguodala negotiations, and much more appeared first on Talking Points.

* Last night several national publications reported that the league has informed teams that this year's salary-cap and luxury-tax numbers will actually be $99M/$119M, which is a $2-3M drop on both sides from recent estimates.

So you want to know: How does this drop affect the Warriors' intentions to re-sign Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston, presuming Kevin Durant is taking the 20% raise in a 1 + 1 deal and Stephen Curry is signing long-term?

Answer: Unless there's some back-door effect that I can't see, the cap/tax numbers dropping won't change the Warriors' situation very much, if at all.

For the Warriors, the most important number isn't the cap, it's the luxury-tax line, which is now estimated to be at $119M (instead of $121M), then the tax apron is $6M above that, at $125M (instead of $127M), which is the unofficial line of demarcation for the Warriors this summer.

They want to stay under $125M, or if they go over, it has to be thought-out carefully and probably has to be done only with their last 1 or 2 moves of the summer.

So, if you factor that Curry's super-max starting salary has now dropped almost $1M (because it's based on a percentage of the cap number), you can see that the Warriors' wiggle room before the apron isn't a lot different than it was with a $127M apron number.

Practically, the cap reduction will affect teams that have existing salary commitments and were budgeting for every bit of cap space on a $102M/$101M estimate in order to sign free agents, right to the cap line.

Teams that want to sign free-agents this summer will have a little less room than they were initially expecting.
Free agents such as... Iguodala and Livingston.

And I don't want to be overly blunt about it, but this was my thinking from the outset: When there's a general scarcity of available dollars, teams that have space tend to go for younger players, not experienced veterans. We'll see what happens here. I hope Andre and Shaun--and all players--get every dollar possible.

--One minor note: The cap isn't actually lowering, since it was $94.1M last year. What's lowering is the actual number from the estimate (it was $108M at one point) given to teams in earlier months and years.

Key point: The Warriors do not need to use cap space to re-sign either player because they have their Bird Rights and can keep them because Durant will take the 20% raise instead of his full max.

Also, the lowering of the cap number means that Durant will leave less money on the table than he would've under the higher estimate--he's now due to get $31.8M with the 20% raise, and his new full max would be $34.6M (as opposed to about $35.5M).

That would also be Curry's starting super-max number: $34.6M and as I've repeatedly said, I see no compelling reason for Curry to take a dollar less.

OK, this is all very technical, but the summary is that the Warriors don't need cap space to re-sign their guys, and the cap space just lessened for other teams that might want to sign their key guys.

And Durant will do just fine.

You might not want to know this, but if a cap-lowering had happened at this time last summer, the Warriors would've had some more trouble fitting Durant into cap space.

They could've done it last July, but it probably would've meant having to give away Livingston to do it.

The Warriors don't have to do that this year because Durant won't have to fit into cap space, and again, it's the cap space that's shrinking.

* The cap number is tied to the revenue that came in during the season. And this year's playoffs had a low number of games, therefore less revenue.

And yes, the Warriors needing only 9 playoff home dates this year had some lowering effect on the cap--the same way needing 14 last year raised it.

So you could say the Warriors helped create the extra room to sign Durant last year by playing all those home dates and breaking all cumulative one-team postseason gate records...

Then they helped put the squeeze other teams trying to sign big free agents this summer by needing only nine home playoff games... and not coming close to the box-office number they racked up for themselves and the league last year.

* Some cumulative stats from the postseason...

I'm posting these now -- after already mentioning them on Twitter last week -- mostly to make sure I have a record of this for future reference (like next June)...

NBA Finals cumulative plus-minus leaders (five games):

1. Iguodala +60

2. Draymond +40

3. Durant +33

4. Curry +30

5. Klay +22

.... LeBron was -7.

Richard Jefferson actually was Cleveland's plus-minus leader at -3. Then Kyle Korver at -5.

Obviously LeBron's number is actually tremendous in true perspective--because he played 212 minutes (88% of the series total) and only was -7, while the Cavaliers were -27 in the 28 minutes (12%) he didn't play.
Which leads to...

---Overall postseason plus-minus leaders (all playoff games):

1. Steph Curry +245

2. Draymond Green +228

3. LeBron James +195

4. Klay T +192

5. Kevin Durant +177

* This stat got people angry and I guess people just want to be angry so I want to make sure it's up on the blog, too...
Draymond Green total minutes 2016 playoffs... 879. Draymond Green total minutes 2017 playoffs... 593.
That's 286 fewer minutes.
Yes, I know Draymond played 23 (of the team's 24) playoff games last year, and this year the Warriors and Draymond played 17 total.

My point is that this would explain why Draymond and all of his teammates looked so much fresher at the end of the Finals this year... compared to last year.

I'm also thinking about career-toll from the playoffs.
LeBron 2017 playoff minutes... 744.
And the big number for him is career playoff minutes... 9,127.

That's about the same as three huge extra regular seasons that LeBron has played, just in the postseason.
For example: Magic Johnson career playoff minutes... 7,538 Michael Jordan career playoff minutes... 7,474

LeBron might DOUBLE those numbers by the time his playoff career is done.

* One thing I forgot to mention in my Jerry West post from last week...

People have asked me what I think he'll bring to the Clippers now that he has joined that franchise in a similar role, and it's an easy answer:

He'll bring aggressiveness, risk-taking, the re-assessment of everything the team thinks and does, and the ability to look past the current temperature of fandom...

And that was exactly what happened when he joined the Warriors in 2011 and immediately started pushing for them to move on from fan-favorite Monta Ellis.

All of that makes sense, but sometimes (or most times) front-office folk can get locked into only trying the easiest path, the one that props up flawed fan favorites, and avoids most of the risk.

Somebody needs to come in and break that up, and for the Warriors, the personification of that was Jerry West. It can get bumpy and tempestuous, and West never has a worry about that.

The Warriors were absolutely like that under Chris Cohan and Robert Rowell, but that turned 180 degrees when Joe Lacob and Peter Guber bought the team.
The clearest practical sign of that was hiring West in May 2011, then just letting him be himself.

I've always thought that one of West's original culture-changing moments was telling me on the day he was hired that the team needed to get bigger at the guard spot, which clearly was a note about Ellis, and signaled that West wanted a bigger guard to team with Curry (and he immediately circled Klay Thompson as the answer there, whom the Warriors drafted a month later).

At that point, even the idea of trading a fan-favorite (he scores! he's on highlight reels! Great Time Out! Who cares if he doesn't play defense!) like Ellis was viewed warily inside GSW offices.

West's vehement opinion over the next few months helped back up the growing sense inside the Warriors' basketball offices that Thompson had to be the starting shooting guard, Ellis had to be moved, and the team had to be handed to Curry.

And if they could get a defensive-minded center in any Ellis trade... hey, maybe Andrew Bogut... that would be ideal.

Myers, then the assistant-GM but obviously set up to take over soon, agreed. So did much of the basketball ops staff.

But Lacob at the time was a huge, huge, huge Ellis fan and let his staff know that if they traded Ellis, it had better be for something good.

West wasn't the only guy pushing for the deal, but he was Jerry West--"the cover of darkness," to use Guber's phrase, meaning that because of West's credibility, the team was given room to do daring things-- that meant a lot, and for those important first few years of the Lacob era, and as Myers established himself as the main voice, West's loud input was essential.

There were other examples, as I mentioned in the earlier piece, but turning the thinking on Ellis was the first one, and it was a signature change for this franchise.

The post Warriors notes: On the salary-cap drop, final playoff statistics and one more thought on Jerry West's departure appeared first on Talking Points.

Steve Kerr and I had been talking for many minutes -- and not boring minutes, I don't think -- on this podcast episode before I brought up the mini-controversy surrounding the Warriors potentially declining or not getting the traditional invitation to the White House for a championship team.

And that's when Kerr surprised me, not for the first time, with a slightly different viewpoint on this than I was expecting.

Kerr said the team hasn't gotten an invitation from President Trump yet, and he knows they might not get one, and it's up to the players, not him...

But Kerr said that he would want his players to consider accepting such an offer as a sign of respect for the office and a gesture towards some sort of general national unity.

Very interesting, very thoughtful, a little surprising coming from Kerr, who has been so public in his distaste for Trump's politics and rhetoric.

But none of us should ever be shocked that Kerr would have a modulated and thought-out perspective, which was in complete display throughout this episode, which included...

-Kerr explaining his embarrassment when he realized he forgot to salute Stephen Curry at the victory parade and discussing why Curry is the key foundation piece to everything;

-The key strategic moments of the Finals;

-What it meant to Kerr to get back on the sidelines for Game 2 of the Finals after missing the previous 11 playoff games and how he felt once he got back;

-How his summer shapes up as Kerr tries to find medical answers for his chronic pain, relating to a spinal-fluid leak two years ago.

The post TK Show: Steve Kerr on the Warriors-Cavaliers strategy, his comeback in the Finals, the White House and more appeared first on Talking Points.

Very good of Marcus Thompson II to stay embedded on the Warriors championship parade route for 24 hours so he could give us all the feel of the moment on our podcast today.

Or at least that's what I think MT was doing -- he was on Klay Thompson's float yesterday, he got great backstage access, then I couldn't find him until MT called us from his cellphone today, somewhere from Downtown Oakland.

Marcus talked about what it was like on the parade route, noted how Stephen Curry, in particular, seemed in a spectacular party mood, and then I asked MT about the continued back-and-forth between Draymond Green and LeBron James.

MT had a great answer for that: LeBron and Draymond are good friends, but....

... it gets competitive, and Draymond thought that the Warriors maybe were being a little too demure in the celebration this time after Cleveland went wild -- and roasted the Warriors repeatedly -- after beating the Warriors last year.

Marcus and I also talked about how the upcoming free-agent period is likely to play out, why Curry should get every dollar possible, and what might be going through Shaun Livingston's ind right now.

Finally, we talked about Mike Brown's future and whether the chemistry changes now that Kevin Durant is getting so much credit for this championship.

The post Warriors Plus Minus: What's going on with Draymond and LeBron, and other post-title issues appeared first on Talking Points.

What's the "30 for 30" theme going to be for this era of the NBA?

I can't help but think about that as I watch ESPN's "Celtics/Lakers: Best of Enemies" two-part documentary runs right after the Warriors beat the Cavaliers in the two teams' third straight NBA Finals meeting.

How will history look at this Warriors championship, coupled with their victory in 2015 and their loss last year?

And there's nobody better to ask about this than ESPN's Zach Lowe, the smartest/best writer covering this sport, and that's exactly what I did for this podcast episode.

Zach also has written recently about how the Warriors' "super-team" ascendancy is affecting other teams, and we talked about what Cleveland, Houston, Boston and others might be thinking this summer, while they look at the talent that the Warriors have accumulated.

Zach and I later discussed the Warriors' financial crunch -- how long will they be able to keep all their stars on this roster, and when might the true payroll crunch occur?

We also talked about the Clippers hiring Jerry West away from the Lakers and how the Warriors balanced things when Steve Kerr was out and Mike Brown took over for 11 playoff games.

The post TK Show: ESPN's Zach Lowe on the Warriors' burgeoning dynasty and how it's affecting the rest of the league appeared first on Talking Points.

OAKLAND -- Warriors GM Bob Myers was lingering in the back of the photo room last night with his wife and father when a call rang out, "Get Bob!"

Kevin Durant was taking his turn posing with the Larry O'Brien trophy, and wanted one or two snaps with Myers, who promptly wound through the crowd and put his arm around the man he brought to the Warriors last July and they smiled next to the golden trophy and there was a lot of whooping and hollering in the room.

Then Myers walked back to his corner of the room in the Coliseum, and talked a little bit with me.

You want perspective on this journey? On what his good friend Steve Kerr went through during the playoffs? On Durant? On Myers' own family situation, still dealing with the tragic death of his wife's brother?

Here it is...

----BOB MYERS interview transcript/

-Q: You go back to the July day in The Hamptons... is this the completion of the circle that was started with Durant back then?

-MYERS: I mean, for him. For him, yeah. For us, there's a lot of twists and turns in all of it.

But to see Kevin, his journey, I don't think you could've scripted it any better.

For us, too, but we're coming off winning one, losing one, and now winning.

I loved watching our players embrace him, and our coaches-- everything that went on with Steve.

You've covered sports a long time. Doesn't matter who's on your team and how much you're supposed to win, it's still hard.

I don't know if it looked easy, but it wasn't.

-Q: I think that was evident by the way your guys reacted when it was over. Just seemed more emotional this time.

-MYERS: I think it was. I think the first one was more of a honeymoon, it was more romantic. That was not a year of pressure; we weren't supposed to win that year.

To go into a season with the expectations... we're human beings, we feel it. It's what you want, you want to have a team you think can win.

But there's a pressure that goes with having all the predictions.

-Q: And 'the greatest team of all-time' stuff. That's a little bit to fulfill.

-MYERS: (Laughs.) Look, we all choose to process that however we want. But you hear things. And for me, there's so much that can go wrong.

And some of the stuff with Steve was an example of that. And you always were thinking about what can go wrong instead of what can go right.

Then you have this moment, and it's the one moment you can say things actually went right. But up until this moment, you don't get to have that, because the job isn't done.

-Q: You had that moment with Steve after the game. Steve was crying. What did that moment mean to you?

-MYERS: I cried. Hugged my wife, because our families are the ones that know more than anybody what was sacrificed.

Then I hugged Steve. And that was the two times... I'm not somebody that cries much, but in those two moments, I did.

And it was a lot of emotion. It was understanding, it was compassion, it was empathy, it was joy, it was... all of it kind of rolled into one.

-Q: Are we ever really going to know what Steve put himself through to get back out there coaching for this series?

-MYERS: I think what we all should know and the people that are going to read this, it was a lot harder than anyone knows.

-Q: All your big free agents have said they're coming back, easy right?

-MYERS: I don't know. I hope so. They all have earned the right to have that opportunity. But I am going to enjoy tonight and start thinking about that tomorrow maybe. But tonight I'm just happy that we got it and happy for them.

-Q: Andre said the press conferences are scheduled.

-MYERS: (Smiles.) He said that? I'm glad he said that. I didn't know that, news to me!

But what a game he had. He stepped up big.

-Q: Like he always does.

-MYERS: He always does. He's a big moment guy. I envy people like that. That's what makes him special.

-Q: Did Steve tell you this might be an Andre Game?

-MYERS: He said he asked him in the morning, 'how many minutes can you give us?' And Andre said as many as you need. And that's kind all you need to hear from him.

He knew it was a moment and he captured it.

The post Bob Myers on Steve Kerr's return to coach in the Finals: "It was a lot harder than anyone knows" appeared first on Talking Points.

OAKLAND -- It was quite a scene in the A's indoor batting cage room, adjacent to Oracle Arena.

That's where the NBA set up a photo stage for the Warriors players, executives and coaches to pose with the Larry O'Brien trophy late last night, and that's where the party was for about 30-45 minutes.

I got there when Kevin Durant was taking pictures with his friends and family, and several coaches and executives just moved around the room in a giddy daze, soaking it all in.

One of them was owner Joe Lacob, who had a sore throat from yelling a bit during and after the game but stepped to an open space for this quick interview with me...

---JOE LACOB interview transcript/

-Intro: Lacob is in the picture room, watching Durant laugh and joke and take pictures with the MVP and championship trophies.

-LACOB: Oh my God, isn't this great? This is so good.

-Q: What are you thinking when you see this scene?

-LACOB: I'm just happy for everybody. People don't realize how much work goes into this.

It sounds like, 'Oh yeah, you put the Hamptons 5 together and just go do it.' It's not that easy.

Bob Myers did an incredible amount of work on the basketball front, all the people there -- Larry Harris and Kirk and Travis...
I think about all the hard work, the really hard work, it took to put together.

I think about Coach Kerr and what he's been through.

It's really hard to win an NBA title. And we beat a great team, by the way.

-Q: And you saw it in the emotions the players showed afterwards. Do you think this was a more powerful reaction than in 2015?
-LACOB: I think maybe. It's hard for me to say. Being at home is just a more emotional thing. Maybe it was. I'll have to think about it in retrospect.

-Q: Do you think about how many more times you can do this? LeBron just said you'll be around a long time.

-LACOB: Really, he said that? Well, we would hope to be.

We certainly have a young -- all in their 20s, at least for now -- core four. And hopefully we can retain some of the other guys and do this again next year.
It's hard because keeping it together financially, which is the obvious next question, long-term is not easy under the NBA rules.
So we can only kind of work one year at a time.

-Q: Will you offer Steph the max he can make?

-LACOB: (Smiles.) I'll leave that to Bob to talk to you guys about.

We're going to do whatever it takes to keep Steph here and happy. And I know he wants to be here and we want him here.
So, I do not anticipate any issues with him staying.

-Q: Andre announced there will be press conferences for the re-signings.

-LACOB: (Laughs.) Let's just see how it goes. It's a little bit complicated, obviously, as you know, with all the numbers and all that stuff.
We're going to have to put together the puzzle and see if we can keep everybody together. And I think we can.

-Q: Steve has said he will keep coaching. Do you have any doubt about him coaching next year after what he went through physically this year?

-LACOB: No doubt. Obviously we want him to get better and he has certainly struggled. But hopefully he does (get better) and he'll be our coach for a long time.

The post Warriors owner Joe Lacob on Steph Curry's contract, the long-term future and more appeared first on Talking Points.

Here are the cumulative Finals plus-minus numbers for the main-rotation players in this series, which I track regularly and I guarantee you the coaches on both sides are tracking extremely carefully.

Of course, plus-minus for any one game or series of games isn't the ultimate number to determine the best player or worst player or middling player of any particular scenario or series, and I will mention one specific scenario that is precisely relative to this series.

This is just the raw number of the score of the game when a particular player is in it, which is relatively important, but I know many fans hate keeping track of the score of the game.

This is how coaches think about setting up their rotations, changing them, keeping combinations of players together or breaking them apart.

I keep track. This is just something to add to the other stats -- points, rebounds, assists, etc. -- and this is the only box score stat that reflects how one player affects overall team defense.

First, a few notes...

* Andre Iguodala currently leads the Warriors' list because he was the only one in the "plus" territory in Game 4 and that's because he's the key Warriors player logging minutes against Cleveland's non-LeBron unit.
So Iguodala was +9 in Game 4, for instance, which included the two mini-runs (+11 for the Warriors in about five combined minutes) the Warriors took while LeBron was out to start the second and fourth quarters... while the rest of the GSW main guys are getting fewer minutes against non-LeBron units.

Also, it's important to add: The number is this good because Iguodala has played so well in those non-LeBron minutes.

* Note: The Warriors are +25 overall in the series, so use that overall number to put all of the players' cumulative total in relation to the series at large.

* Note:

In the 166 minutes LeBron has been on the floor in this series, Cleveland is...... +6.

In the 26 minutes he has been off, Cleveland is.................................................... -31.

OK, here's the full list (and also the overall postseason plus-minus leaders at the bottom).

I used main-rotation players -- for Cleveland, I used 50 total minutes as the cut-off, and I just used all of the main guys Warriors fans know are in the rotation...

----WARRIORS cumulative plus-minus in the 4 Finals games so far/
Andre Iguodala......... +42

Klay Thompson...... +28 (also getting key time vs. non-LeBron units)

Stephen Curry......... +27 (does not play vs. non-LeBron units)
Draymond Green.... +21 (foul trouble has limited his time vs. non-LeBron units)

Kevin Durant.......... +15 (a few minutes vs. non-LeBron units)

Zaza Pachulia.......... +5

Shaun Livingston.... -18

JaVale McGee.......... +4 (in only 24 total minutes)

Patrick McCaw........ +3 (in 23 minutes)

Ian Clark................... 0 (in in 44 minutes)

David West............... 0 (in 40 minutes)

---CAVALIERS cumulative plus-minus in the 4 Finals games so far/
LeBron James.......... +6
Iman Shumpert........  0
Kyle Korver............... -5
Richard Jefferson.... -6
Deron Williams........ -9
Kevin Love............... -12
J.R. Smith............... -20

Tristan Thompson.. -34

Kyrie Irving............. -36

---And finally, here's the top 6 total cumulative postseason plus-minus numbers updated through Game 4/

1. Curry +242

2. Draymond +209

3. LeBron +205

4. Klay +198

5. Love +170

6. Durant +159

The post Warriors-Cavaliers series individual plus-minus numbers through Game 4 appeared first on Talking Points.

--JERRY WEST interview transcript/

-Q: I know you're up in Alaska. Were you able to watch last night's game?

-WEST: Yes, when we got to the dock here in town.

It's like being on an elevator -- top floor the first half, basement the third quarter, ended up in the penthouse in the last part of the game.

It was pretty impressive for the way that they stuck to it and then Kevin--his greatness prevailed.

Obviously Steph's popularity is well deserved, but Kevin was sort of flying under the radar all year. People just don't know how great he is. They don't.

One of the things I was sure of, he was going to show people what a great all-round player he was.

There was so much pressure on he and Russell (Westbrook) to score. And they did score. But in this situation, Kevin is showing that he's a generational player.

-Q: What makes Durant and Curry special together? Did we see it all in that last 6:30 last night?

-WEST: Kevin's size and versatility... When you watch Steph play this is not the biggest guy in the world, he doesn't fly around like Russell Westbrook. He does things with such a different flair and fun to watch, exciting.

And Kevin, he is so efficient. He doesn't even look like he's exerting himself. And players like that I think almost can fly under the radar, except the people in the basketball world, they know how great he is.

I'm thrilled for him, thrilled for the Warriors and for the fans of the Warriors. They're seeing something really special right now.

-Q: If they go 16-0, will this be the greatest postseason ever and rank them among the best or as the best ever?

-WEST: I wouldn't even get into that.

The game is played so differently, just completely different. Look in this series, has anyone big played much? No, not really.

The rules have allowed game to change so now it's just a completely different game. It's the three-point line--last night we had an extraordinary shooting night, a test of the greatness of the players who can shoot the ball from that distance.

You can go back and check, the Lakers when they won the championship when the three-point line came in, that was a shot that was hardly ever taken except Byron Scott and Michael Cooper. Nobody else shot it. Just a different game.

-Q: What is your general view of this entire undefeated playoff run?

-WEST: I've been so fortunate in my life to be part of some really fun things, and some incredibly disappointing things.

But they've shown a dominance that I can't remember ever seeing. It would show the greatness of four All-Star players and their pack of helpers. It would be special to see.

I'll never see it again in my lifetime, I don't think. It's just special, the legions of fans that the Warriors have and the fans of the Bay Area--my gosh, you're seeing something special. And you may not ever see it again.

As my basketball life passes before me, I marvel at what's happening.
-Q: What was your reaction to seeing Steve Kerr struggle with his health and miss all those games and then get back for the last two?

-WEST: He has put in a system that he has players that have followed that system and that's why they were able to prosper (without Kerr for 11 games).

But the thing I am most happy about for him is he's feeling better. Forget the coaching aspect. He's feeling better. He's a great guy and it's been a pleasure for me to get to know him a little bit differently. I'm thrilled for him personally that he's coaching again.
-Q: How do you think the Warriors have taken control of this series?

-WEST: I don't know if (the Cavaliers) can play any better than they did last night. I really don't.

With us, if we continue to make mistakes we always give them a chance. We're going to make more mistakes than most teams because we have so many willing passers and so many good ones and we play at a quicker pace.

We're going to make more mistakes that way. If we can just limit that...

-Q: What did you think of Magic Johnson recently saying his Lakers probably could've swept the Warriors? And all the other players who've said similar things about their old teams?

-WEST: None of these players from the past need to be talking. I know everyone's prideful with the careers they've had. I just think they should understand it's a different time and a different era and don't even try to compare teams.

-Q: OK, can you give an update on your talks with the Clippers and your future with the Warriors?

-WEST: I don't have any update on that. I've got a decision to make. I don't know what that decision is going to be. I don't really want to talk about it.

I just want to say that you can't find better people than these players. Just incredible people. Fun to be around, really nice people when you see them they are who they are. They're not someone hiding behind false pretenses.

They are who they are. Just a unique collection of people that are just great people. That in itself is just amazing.

To have a 'super team' and not only have incredible talent but incredible camaraderie, they like each other. I've never seen that in my existence in the NBA.

That's what makes it fun for me.

-Q: When you talked with Durant on the phone last July, did you mention that you thought he could be in this spot, about to win a championship?

-WEST: I did not talk about that. Only thing I said to him, his all-around game, people will start to appreciate that. And this is what was hidden.

He's unbelievably prideful, he is classy. He's one of the classiest stars I've ever seen in my life. I just said to him, his all-around greatness as a player would come out playing with this team.

And to come here and have all the crap that was put on him, 'Can't believe he would do this' ... That was so stupid.

For anyone to say that, they should be embarrassed.

He had a choice to make.  If he had gone back to Oklahoma City and they had lost... then what would people say? If the Lakers got him, would people be complaining like this? No. If Boston got him, would people be complaining? The answer is no.

And the way he's been treated by some people, ex-players in particular... I think it's horrible.

He's just a great person. If you look at him and you're around him, he's an unbelievable professional. There's not a player in the league that wouldn't want to play with him, not a coach in the league that wouldn't want to coach him.

-Q: Do you think the Warriors are set up to win three for four more titles?

-WEST: Listen one missed step and it's done, OK?

This is an excellent team... but one missed step, and you're not the same team. This is what sports are about.

This team wasn't healthy a year ago and probably one incident maybe changed the outcome a year ago.

I don't like to put the cart before the horse. They've got to win one more game and maybe they can do it tomorrow night. I'll be watching.

-Q: So where are you now?

-WEST: Just got to Ketchikan.

The post Jerry West interview transcript: On Durant's "generational" greatness, this special Warriors team, and his employment decision appeared first on Talking Points.