Can Chris Paul claim a starting spot with the Golden State Warriors? Here’s what Steve Kerr had to say
The former Suns star is one of the best in the business, and that is precisely why many are wondering what his role in the Bay Area will be.
Even casual fans of the game could understand the idea that a starting spot for Chris Paul in Golden State was never going to be guaranteed, but just where will the veteran fit in, and if/when he does will he be satisfied with going from being the focal point for his previous team, to a role player for his new one?
Golden State’s Steve Kerr talks Chris Paul’s role
It would be fair to say that Chris Paul is not only a veteran of the NBA, but one of the league’s best. When you consider that he’s played in 1,214 NBA games and has started all of them, it becomes obvious. This is to say that Paul is not a role player. Indeed, players who are on course to be Hall of Fame inductees never really are. Now, as you may know, the former Phoenix Suns star shocked the league with an unexpected move - understatement of the year - to the Golden State Warriors, a team laden with talent and more importantly, in Paul’s position. Add to that the fact that the 38-year-old himself indicated as recently as July, that he wasn’t too keen on the idea of coming off the bench in the Bay Area. After all, we’re talking about a player that’s never come off the bench in his career.
Yet, the reality is, that may just be the situation that Paul finds himself in this coming season. Even more so when we give an ear to the Golden State head coach, Steve Kerr, who indicated at Team USA camp on Friday that no decisions had been made about who would start for the Warriors and who would not. “I think that’ll be a case where you get three weeks of training camp before that first game,” Kerr said. “We’ll just look at all kinds of different combinations. “The main thing is we know all those guys are going to play a lot of minutes. But the luxury of having Chris Paul to add to this group that we’ve been lucky enough to have for a decade...pretty remarkable. He is one of the great competitors in the game. He’s one of the great point guards of all time. I think he’s a great addition for us, because of his ability to control games, control tempo, take care of the ball.”
What is Chris Paul facing?
As stated before, the Warriors are full of stars and that’s aside from the starting lineup of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Andrew Wiggins, Draymond Green, and Kevon Looney. This is a team that was second only to the eventual champions, the Denver Nuggets, in scoring. For clarity’s sake, the Warriors starting five is the same group of players that won the championship last year, and where Curry, Green, and Thompson are concerned, they’ve got four championship rings a piece. What this means is that Chris Paul has got his work cut out for him when it comes to earning a starting spot.
Where Curry and Thompson are concerned, we’re talking about icons of the team, and possibly the league’s best backcourt for quite a few seasons now i.e., it’s hard to see either of them being supplanted by Paul. Then, there’s the size issue which is to say, as tempting as it would be to start the 12-time NBA All-Star alongside the ‘Splash Brothers’, it would rob the Warriors of the invaluable size that Andrew Wiggins offers. As for Green and Looney, the tasks of disruption and rebounding that they are respectively charged with can really only be completed by them. So, logic would dictate that the former Rookie of the Year will come off the bench for the first time in his career. On the other hand, if we take Kerr’s comments at face value, the team may be able to come up with a combination in which Paul can feature. Ultimately, the only thing that’s certain at this point, is that it’s going to be very interesting to see how Kerr and Co. handle the process of convincing one of six stars - whoever it may be - to take on a role they almost certainly don’t think they should.