The Golden State Warriors have lost seven games this season. Stephen Curry has played in six of those losses, and in half of them, the Warriors actually won the minutes that he played. Such was the case again on Saturday, when the Warriors outscored the Phoenix Suns by four points with Curry on the floor, but the Suns won the game in the end, 113-105.
Teams losing games with their benches is nothing new, but consider Curry’s playing time in these games. Curry has not reached 33 minutes in any loss this season. Meanwhile, Steve Kerr has gone deeper onto his bench than any other coach in the NBA. The standard NBA coach uses nine or 10 players in a regular-season game. A particularly aggressive coach like Tom Thibodeau might trim that number to eight. Others might occasionally stretch that figure to 11.
But on Saturday, Kerr used all 13 active players at his disposal. While 13 is a bit higher than usual, 12 has been the norm for Golden State, and 11 is more or less the bare minimum. And after Saturday’s defeat, Curry hinted that it might be time to run a slightly more traditional rotation.
“It is hard for anybody to try to get a rhythm… that’s tough,” Curry said. “We are a unique team; it’s a unique situation. I don’t think it’s ever been done in the league. But it’s an 82-game schedule. You got to figure out what adjustments you need to make. To your question, do we need to shorten it? We probably need to be more predictable on a night-to-night basis so guys can get a little bit of a rhythm. Is that shortening it one or two guys? Maybe.”
The Warriors are currently in the middle of the a four-game losing streak, and with a brutal schedule stretch ahead, some sort of adjustment likely will be needed to keep them near the top of the Western Conference. A trimmed rotation seemed likely after key wing De’Anthony Melton suffered a season-ending ACL injury, but Kerr has simply gone down the bench, giving former undrafted free agent Pat Spencer rotation minutes in Golden State’s last two games.
Depth is incredibly meaningful over the course of an 82-game season. It’s the best insulator against injuries, and a team built around older stars like Golden State is likely to deal with some in the coming months. But Curry has a point about rhythm. It’s hard for anyone to play their best basketball when their minutes are inconsistent. By using their best players more, the Warriors could potentially get far more out of them while saving their deeper bench pieces for later in the season when they may be needed.
