Pass/Fail: Doc Rivers gives Kerr advice on how to handle Westbrook @ All Star Game

[playahaitian]

Doc Rivers gives Steve Kerr advice on how to handle Russell Westbrook at All-Star Game

Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant made it quite clear in Saturday’s showdown that the two former teammates haven’t let bygones be bygones. With the NBA All-Star Game less than a week away, how will Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr keep the situation between the two stars civil when he takes the reins of the Western Conference squad?

Doc Rivers said when he coached the Eastern Conference All-Stars in 2008 and 2011 while with the Celtics he made sure to cater to other players even at the expense of his own players.

“I made sure they loved me, the other ones,” the Los Angeles Clippers coach said, via the Associated Press. “I knew my guys liked me. That was not my concern.”


Rivers admitted that he didn’t ask his former Celtics players whom they wanted to play with during the exhibition game or even how much playing time they wanted.

“Like, I would bench them,” Rivers said. “But I didn’t want some guy trying to score 50 on us when we played them, so I was really good at that and I went to each guy, ‘How much do you want to play? Do you want to play?'”

Tempers flared between Westbrook and Durant during the Warriors’ 130-114 win over the Thunder in Oklahoma City, the first time Durant had played in OKC since leaving for Golden State last summer. The Warriors have four players on this year’s Western Conference All-Star team – Durant, Stephen Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson – and now Kerr is in the awkward position of keeping Westbrook, the reigning two-time All-Star Game MVP, happy while not alienating his stars during Sunday’s festivities.

http://www.foxsports.com/nba/story/...dle-russell-westbrook-at-all-star-game-021317

 

[REDLINE]

This is a tough one but it's business, I look forward to seeing how it plays out.

 

[A to Dah K]

If im durants coach i make them sit down and get over the shit before the game. If they dont want to then i cap both of their minutes, fuck that

 

[playahaitian]

Steve Kerr chides ’embarrassing’ intensity level at All-Star Game

Nhat V. Meyer/Bay Area News Group
Warriors head coach Steve Kerr watches the game from the bench against the Bulls in the fourth quarter at Oracle Arena in Oakland on Feb. 8, 2017.
By DANIEL MANO | dmano@bayareanewsgroup.com |
PUBLISHED: March 4, 2017 at 5:32 pm | UPDATED: March 4, 2017 at 5:48 pm


Steve Kerr sounded a bit like his old coach, Gregg Popovich, in lambasting players for their lack of effort in the NBA All-Star Game last month.

Instead of complaining about how the 3-point shot has affected the league, as the Spurs coach did last season, Kerr critiqued how little the All-Stars try nowadays in the midseason showcase.


“In my mind, what’s happened is everybody is trying to be so cool out there that you almost feel guilty if you play hard. Maybe the best thing to do will be to watch a tape of an All-Star Game from about 1985, because it was a different game back then,” Kerr told ESPN. “It wasn’t like guys were diving on the floor for loose balls and taking charges, but it was competitive. And I think you’re just as likely to get hurt not trying than you are competing at 75 percent. And that’s all they need to do, is compete at 75 percent. Right now, they’re like at 10 percent, and that’s embarrassing.”

The Warriors coach had an up-close look at the 2017 All-Star Game as coach of the Western Conference. And he seemingly wants a change in the All-Star format to encourage players actually competing.

“I think we could talk about gimmicks and talk about anything we want, whether it’s the money or involves charity, it just comes down to the players taking it seriously,” Kerr said. “I don’t think they have to be out there taking charges, but it’s a collective thing. I think they have to decide, maybe with the players’ association, they have to decide what they want that game to look like and right now, it’s a joke.”

Kerr said the onus is on the players to change things.

“Players have to make that decision, and I think they need to understand that it would be good for the league if they did compete,” Kerr said. “Again, you’re not undercutting people in transition, you’re not taking charges, you’re not diving on the floor for loose balls. But if you’re staying in front of guys and if somebody throws a pass in your direction, you’re going to steal it. I mean, I saw guys in that game purposely not stealing the ball even though it was thrown right to them. It’s bizarre, but it’s the way the game has been trending for years. I think it would be great for the league if the players took it upon themselves to say, ‘You know what, let’s make this an entertaining game for the fans, because right now it’s kind of an embarrassment.’”

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/03/...mbarrassing-intensity-level-at-all-star-game/