Speaker 1: Five. Here's torn the.
Speaker 2: Second.
Speaker 3: Lots of NBA players keep one foot in the door
Speaker 3: after retiring, per some coach, others head to the front office,
Speaker 3: and others make a career in broadcasting.
Speaker 1: It takes a special.
Speaker 3: Kind of person to do all of that and do
Speaker 3: it well. And in this game, that guy is Steve Kerr.
Speaker 3: I have a very long intro to you, so I'm
Speaker 3: going to make a quick.
Speaker 1: Basketball legend.
Speaker 3: Steve Kerr as head coach of the Golden State Warriors,
Speaker 3: leading the team to four NBA titles as a player
Speaker 3: equally remarkable three with the Bulls, two.
Speaker 1: With the Spurs.
Speaker 3: Also front office of the Suns, color commentator for NBA
Speaker 3: on T and T, and coach of the men's Olympic
Speaker 3: team in Paris.
Speaker 1: Steve, Wow. First of all, that's a lot of hardware.
Speaker 1: Where do you keep everything?
Speaker 4: I don't really display it. I just send a daily
Speaker 4: thank you note to Michael Jordan, Tim Duncan, Steph Kurry,
Speaker 4: Greg Pop. That's all I write. I just write a
Speaker 4: quick text thanks guys, and that's it.
Speaker 3: You just practice gratitude and also which is very healthy.
Speaker 3: By the way, Although I do think you're you are
Speaker 3: a common denominator obviously, so you have to take some credit.
Speaker 1: So we're going to talk about you.
Speaker 4: I'll take some.
Speaker 5: A lot of small lineup tonight for BOTHO Steve, yeahead,
Speaker 5: Steve for another trade, just turn around, fought and fired
Speaker 5: ten points Raham.
Speaker 3: After retiring from the NBA in two thousand and three,
Speaker 3: Steve found his way to broadcasting as a game analyst
Speaker 3: on T and T. His broadcasting career was interrupted by
Speaker 3: a stint in the Phoenix Suns front office from two
Speaker 3: thousand and seven to twenty ten.
Speaker 6: So stop take him right away and when he comes
Speaker 6: up the floor, so.
Speaker 1: It flips a club.
Speaker 3: Steve's plan was to coach, and that didn't happen overnight,
Speaker 3: even though it seemed that way. Let's talk about your
Speaker 3: first coaching job, and you were a star wart, you know,
Speaker 3: having a great career, broadcasting career, NBA on TNT, and
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, it's like Steve Carr gets hired
Speaker 3: as head coach of the Warriors.
Speaker 1: I know it wasn't that simple.
Speaker 3: What was the backstory of coming out of the booth
Speaker 3: and onto the sidelines.
Speaker 4: I think the backstory was I missed the competition, so
Speaker 4: I was in broadcasting for four years. Right after I retired,
Speaker 4: missed the competition, got into management in Phoenix, didn't love
Speaker 4: the job, wasn't great at it, knew I wanted to coach,
Speaker 4: and decided to go back to broadcasting and prepare to coach.
Speaker 4: And I think all those experiences really helped the broadcasting,
Speaker 4: the playing, the management in Phoenix, and then I just
Speaker 4: had a lot of good advice along the way. I
Speaker 4: was when I went back to TNT after my Phoenix stint,
Speaker 4: I was visiting with a lot of coaches, asking how
Speaker 4: I should prepare to get ready for a coaching job, interviews,
Speaker 4: that sort of thing. So I really spent a good
Speaker 4: couple of years writing down all my thoughts ideas, what's
Speaker 4: my philosophy going to be as a coach. So by
Speaker 4: the time I interviewed with Warriors, I felt really prepared,
Speaker 4: but I still needed them to give me, give me
Speaker 4: a shot and take a chance on me.
Speaker 1: So did you have a notebook that you kept everything in.
Speaker 4: The guy who really gave me the idea was Jeff
Speaker 4: Van Gundy. We were speaking at a sports conference one
Speaker 4: summer together. We were on a panel together, and I
Speaker 4: just asked him, I said, what would you do if
Speaker 4: you were a me, and he said, think of everything
Speaker 4: that you're going to do as a coach and write
Speaker 4: it down. Anything you think of, write it down. And
Speaker 4: what I did was probably once a week, I would
Speaker 4: just start typing and thinking of different thoughts and ideas.
Speaker 4: And Jeff's point was, before long, you actually have something
Speaker 4: tangible number one to put in front of a potential employer,
Speaker 4: but more importantly, you really it's an exercise that forces
Speaker 4: you to collect your thoughts and figure out kind of
Speaker 4: who you are and what you would be like, and
Speaker 4: what your culture would feel like and all of that.
Speaker 4: So Jeff was a huge help to me. And then
Speaker 4: I met with a lot of different coaches from different sports.
Speaker 4: Bill Parcells had lunch. Yeah, yeah, I went to Saratoga.
Speaker 4: I was in New York visiting family with my wife,
Speaker 4: and I was connected with Bill Parcells. I went up
Speaker 4: and had lunch with him at Saratoga Country Club and
Speaker 4: it was amazing. I was such a you know, I've
Speaker 4: always been an NFL fan and Parcels and I couldn't
Speaker 4: be any more different, but you know, to hear his
Speaker 4: thoughts on coaching and his ideas, and it was fantastic.
Speaker 3: Is there one conversation that looking back in retrospecting like, wow,
Speaker 3: that guy nailed it and everything.
Speaker 4: He said, yeah, yeah, Pete Carroll, I spent three days
Speaker 4: in Seattle watching training camp. This would have been in
Speaker 4: like July of fourteen, so after I took the Warriors job,
Speaker 4: but before I started, and I'd always loved Pete just
Speaker 4: watching his teams, seeing his energy. You could feel the culture,
Speaker 4: you could feel the vibe that came through the screen
Speaker 4: when you watched his teams, and so to get a
Speaker 4: look at him for three days sitting in on the
Speaker 4: coaches meetings. He was so generous with the scrimmages. Were
Speaker 4: standing behind the huddle, He's like, go get in the huddle, Like,
Speaker 4: listen to what Russell's saying. You know, was listen to
Speaker 4: the play he's calling. I'm like, literally in the huddle
Speaker 4: and Russell Wilson's calling the plays. I'm like, what am
Speaker 4: I doing here? How did this happen? But Pete was
Speaker 4: so great and he spent you know, at the end
Speaker 4: of the three days, we spent a couple of hours
Speaker 4: really talking about philosophy and coaching and what coaching is about.
Speaker 4: And to this day he remains a mentor and a
Speaker 4: close friend, but he made a huge impact on me.
Speaker 3: When he felt ready to take a coaching job, Steve
Speaker 3: had suitors, including his former coach, Phil Jackson, who at
Speaker 3: the time was general manager of the New York Knicks.
Speaker 4: Well, Phil offered me the job before the Warriors job
Speaker 4: was a right pretty far down the road, and I
Speaker 4: was really excited to work with and for my mental
Speaker 4: you know, Phil changed my whole career. My experience in
Speaker 4: Chicago really set the stage for everything that's happened since.
Speaker 4: And just an amazing coach, an amazing human beings. So
Speaker 4: I was all set to go, but the Warriors job
Speaker 4: opened up, and I hadn't signed a contract in New York,
Speaker 4: and you know, here's here's Steph Curry, here's Clay Thompson,
Speaker 4: here's this young talented group. And it was really a
Speaker 4: difficult decision for me by one of my of my
Speaker 4: good friends, Danny Ferry, who's my teammate in Cleveland in
Speaker 4: San Antonio. He was GM, I think of it either
Speaker 4: Atlanta or Cleveland at the time. I think Cleveland. I
Speaker 4: called him and I said, what do you think and
Speaker 4: he goes, well, what do you think Phil Jackson would
Speaker 4: do oh, you know, I said, well, that's a good question.
Speaker 4: He said he'd probably go to the town. And I
Speaker 4: had a couple of other Rick Carlisle Great, you know,
Speaker 4: president of the Coaches Association, and he called me and
Speaker 4: he goes, Look, the thing I learned most with coaching,
Speaker 4: it's all about the players. It's all about your talent.
Speaker 4: As much as you love Phil, Golden State has the talent.
Speaker 4: And then the other factor. My daughter was a sophomore
Speaker 4: at Berkeley, so it was like, oh, I get to
Speaker 4: be right in her backyard. And you know, it seems
Speaker 4: like an obvious decision, but at the time it was.
Speaker 4: It was very difficult saying no to Phil because he
Speaker 4: meant so much to me.
Speaker 3: Kerr joined a Warriors team that hadn't won a title
Speaker 3: since their third back in nineteen seventy five, even though
Speaker 3: they had a brief thrilling ride from nineteen eighty nine
Speaker 3: to ninety one with Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond and Chris
Speaker 3: Mullen run TMC Partaway.
Speaker 1: Mullen now has six.
Speaker 5: Owen's Wide opening the right nat part of way, there's
Speaker 5: the three.
Speaker 1: Nineteen.
Speaker 3: Nonetheless, the franchise spent a lot of time in the
Speaker 3: basement of the Western Conference. From nineteen ninety five to
Speaker 3: two thousand and six, they never broke forty wins and
Speaker 3: six times failed to win even twenty five games. At
Speaker 3: one stretch, the Warriors went twelve straight seasons without a
Speaker 3: playoff appearance.
Speaker 1: But in two thousand and nine, with.
Speaker 7: The seventh pick in the two thousand and nine NBA Draft,
Speaker 7: the Golden State Gloriors select Stephen Curry from.
Speaker 1: Davidson Town, and two years later.
Speaker 7: With the eleventh pick in the twenty eleven NBA Draft,
Speaker 7: the Golden State Warriors select Clay Thompson from Washington State.
Speaker 3: The Warriors, nicknamed the Dubs, started their ascent under head
Speaker 3: coach Mark Jackson before they hired Steve Kerr in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 1: Curry with the black shot.
Speaker 4: He tops it with a three response, and I think
Speaker 4: one of the reasons I got the job, frankly, was
Speaker 4: I told the Warriors about my experiences in Chicago and
Speaker 4: San Antonio winning championships and that that's what it took,
Speaker 4: and that that's what I was going to sell you
Speaker 4: know that, Hey, we've got this great team. Mark Jackson's
Speaker 4: done an amazing job the last couple of years. The
Speaker 4: defense is great. You know, here are a few adjustments
Speaker 4: that I would make offensively, but this team is ready
Speaker 4: to take the next step, and what I learned in
Speaker 4: Chicago and San Antonio, I think I can implements. Here's
Speaker 4: a kicker, all right. So I'm like shooting about ninety
Speaker 4: five for ninety seven percent and I lose every time.
Speaker 4: It makes no sense.
Speaker 3: In the spring of twenty fifteen, I had the chance
Speaker 3: to focus on one NBA team for my special episode
Speaker 3: of Face to Face with Hannah Storm on ESPN.
Speaker 4: That's it, that's what he does.
Speaker 3: So off I went to spend a week with the
Speaker 3: war in Oakland. Here's some of that special courtesy of ESPN.
Speaker 8: Y'all are making him nervous.
Speaker 2: This is the thirty foot birdyfoot to win, to win
Speaker 2: the match.
Speaker 4: What makes him such a great shooter the rhythm and
Speaker 4: the snap of the risk. There's just this kind of
Speaker 4: relaxed flow to his shot that's pretty rare, and it's
Speaker 4: starting to piss me on.
Speaker 3: One of the things that struck me was how much
Speaker 3: fun the Warriors were having. They were literally playing horse
Speaker 3: in practice. There was joy built into all of their
Speaker 3: hard work, and in the end, their most joyous player
Speaker 3: and his teammates changed the game forever.
Speaker 5: Courry's got it, Curry, I let it go, the three
Speaker 5: cups up, short, offensive rebound carry again.
Speaker 4: It's a great.
Speaker 8: Time game. It's amazing.
Speaker 1: It is amazing.
Speaker 3: What's from the NBA and iHeart podcast This is NBA
Speaker 3: DNA with me Hannah Storm, Episode ten dub Nation. Before
Speaker 3: Steve Kerr got to the Bay Area, the Warriors were
Speaker 3: already a team with major potential.
Speaker 1: Clay Thompson and Reggie Williams on his kils and hits
Speaker 1: the jumper?
Speaker 8: How about that?
Speaker 5: Rich Organs.
Speaker 3: In the twenty twelve thirteen NBA season, they made it
Speaker 3: to the playoffs for the first time in three years.
Speaker 1: Under coach Mark Jackson.
Speaker 3: Steph Curry made two hundred and seventy two three pointers
Speaker 3: during the regular season.
Speaker 8: There's the freebet.
Speaker 1: It's staff crops of the three?
Speaker 6: Why I shot something else?
Speaker 1: Isn't it quick?
Speaker 4: Smooth?
Speaker 3: He and Klay Thompson became known as the Splash Brothers
Speaker 3: for their ability to sink dramatic three pointers.
Speaker 1: Hey Thompson is a.
Speaker 6: Three point shooter. Thompson and Steph Curry have thirty five
Speaker 6: between him. They're nine of seventeen on.
Speaker 3: Threes, hurried down, dream On Green was the grit and
Speaker 3: soul of the team, and andre Iguadulla, the wise veteran.
Speaker 1: All the pieces just worked.
Speaker 3: Here's Andre You must have seen a pretty clear vision
Speaker 3: because the Kings and the Nuggets offered you sixty million
Speaker 3: over four years, and I believe the Golden State Warriors
Speaker 3: had enough cap space to offer you forty eight million.
Speaker 3: That's I mean, so you took a twelve million dollar
Speaker 3: flyer to go to the Bay Area, which is really remarkable.
Speaker 9: I've been I played in Phybey for eight years, one
Speaker 9: year in Denver, and I knew I'm probably on the
Speaker 9: back end.
Speaker 8: Of my rear.
Speaker 5: Oh wow, why hold on that that the people up
Speaker 5: here behind us, guys are yelling, alling off.
Speaker 9: What I wanted at the minimum was to, you know,
Speaker 9: wake up every day and look forward to going to work.
Speaker 9: And I can see a sense of joy coming from
Speaker 9: the Golden State Warriors. You know, I knew the guys
Speaker 9: really enjoyed playing for Mark Jackson. I knew he was
Speaker 9: a great motivator. I knew he had his guys on
Speaker 9: one accord. They felt like they had great collaboration. And
Speaker 9: I knew I wanted to end my career in a
Speaker 9: situation like that. I could see the talent there. You know,
Speaker 9: that was like Steph Curry's coming out party. You know,
Speaker 9: he had gotten over the ankle injuries. You know, you're
Speaker 9: starting to find a stride. You know, he had an
Speaker 9: amazing series the next series against the San Antonio Spurs.
Speaker 9: You know, they didn't come out on top, but you know,
Speaker 9: you can just kind of see it bruin. You can
Speaker 9: see Klay Thompson coming to his own. You know, I
Speaker 9: went up against Clay for six games in that same series,
Speaker 9: and he guarded me a good amount, and I said, oh,
Speaker 9: this is the young kid can defend. You know, he's
Speaker 9: not just a shooter. And with the confidence that Mark
Speaker 9: Jackson gave him that first press conference, I said, you know,
Speaker 9: I think we have a real shot at making some
Speaker 9: noise in this league, not just going making a run
Speaker 9: at the playoffs. We have an opportunity to do something
Speaker 9: above and beyond that. And I didn't mention like championships
Speaker 9: or you know, how many we win, but I really thought,
Speaker 9: you know, we can put ourselves in the position where
Speaker 9: we can realistically think about making a run for it.
Speaker 3: In Andrea's first season with the team. They played well,
Speaker 3: ending the regular season with a fifty one and thirty
Speaker 3: one record, one of the.
Speaker 1: Best Enfranchise history.
Speaker 3: They made it to the playoffs and took the number
Speaker 3: three seed LA Clippers to a game seven in the
Speaker 3: first round.
Speaker 6: The Clippers lead a current C three so already, Curry,
Speaker 6: let's take in the free shots cras in this series.
Speaker 8: Score more for.
Speaker 9: It was surprising, very surprising to win fifty one games.
Speaker 9: I never forget we won the fiftieth game of that
Speaker 9: regular season and it was a mini celebration. You know,
Speaker 9: how many organizations in the NBA have the opportunity to
Speaker 9: win fifty games, and in the Western Conference that's the
Speaker 9: sixth place. That just shows how competitive, you know, the
Speaker 9: West has been for you know, the last few decades.
Speaker 9: So being down a few men going into the playoffs
Speaker 9: and our rotation is really six seven guys. We have
Speaker 9: like seven guy rotation, and we take the Clippers to
Speaker 9: a seven game series, and you know, you're looking at
Speaker 9: Lob City as one of the teams, one of the
Speaker 9: best teams of all time.
Speaker 8: They never won a championship.
Speaker 6: We got game set coming up to the Los Angeles
Speaker 6: on set.
Speaker 8: And then to see the ups and downs of the season.
Speaker 9: Uh, things that you know you never see from the
Speaker 9: outside looking in, but you understand the NBA culture. You
Speaker 9: get a feeling of where the organization might be heading.
Speaker 9: And so the decision was a shock, but when you
Speaker 9: look back and seeing how a lot of things transpire,
Speaker 9: you can you can kind of see it coming.
Speaker 3: After the heartbreaking lost to the Clippers, the Warriors front
Speaker 3: office parted ways with Mark Jackson.
Speaker 9: We really enjoy what Mark Jackson brought to the table.
Speaker 9: So it's uncertainty. You know, when there's change, there's uncertainty.
Speaker 9: And then with Steve Kerr comes in, you're trying to
Speaker 9: figure out, like who this guy is, what's going to
Speaker 9: be about, what changes he's going to make. And I
Speaker 9: think a lot of guys had to open mind when
Speaker 9: he stepped on into that role, and he's trying to
Speaker 9: lead us into the next way.
Speaker 3: As Jackson's replacement, Kerr was an unproven entity replacing a
Speaker 3: popular coach, but he had championship credentials, a vision, and
Speaker 3: a game changing talent in Steph Curry.
Speaker 4: Well, he was exactly who I thought he would be
Speaker 4: on a human level because I had spoken with him
Speaker 4: a couple of times before, and I knew Dell and
Speaker 4: I knew the family was amazing, and so he was
Speaker 4: exactly who I thought he would be as a person.
Speaker 4: I didn't know just how good he was. I knew
Speaker 4: he was a great shooter, but the first few months
Speaker 4: of the season he was taking the craziest shots, and
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, dribbling six times, threw his legs
Speaker 4: around the back, fade away three pointer shots that every
Speaker 4: coach I've ever had was would be like, you know,
Speaker 4: what are you doing? What kind of shot is that?
Speaker 4: You've got to be kidding me? And it really took
Speaker 4: me several months to understand the power of Steph's talent
Speaker 4: and his audacity and how how demoralizing that was her opponent.
Speaker 4: I was looking at it like that's a bad shot.
Speaker 4: Then after a while I was like, all right, it's
Speaker 4: going in forty percent of the time, you know, so
Speaker 4: that's a good shot. But it was more than that.
Speaker 4: It was just the how deflating it was for opponents
Speaker 4: and how confident and brash he wasn't what that did
Speaker 4: with the crowd and our team, it was just stunning
Speaker 4: to watch. I had never seen anything like it.
Speaker 1: The girl drop it in the door.
Speaker 4: That's pretty play the nine point.
Speaker 8: Might at the half.
Speaker 3: And then of course there was his splash brother, Clay Thompson,
Speaker 3: also the son of an NBA player, twelve year veteran
Speaker 3: Michael Thompson.
Speaker 4: Well, I think what made him a great compliment was
Speaker 4: that he didn't need the ball in his hands. He
Speaker 4: loved to play off the ball. Steph could could do either.
Speaker 4: You know, Steph could play on or off the ball,
Speaker 4: And so it allowed us to have all this movement
Speaker 4: where you got both guys flying off screens and the
Speaker 4: defense is terrified and they're chasing both of them, and
Speaker 4: all of a sudden there's a wide open layup for
Speaker 4: someone else. But the other way that Clay complimented Steph
Speaker 4: was that he was great defensively on the ball, and
Speaker 4: it allowed Steph to go and guard you off the ball,
Speaker 4: where he was better, and we could stick Clay on
Speaker 4: the toughest guy, whether it was you know, Kyrie Irving
Speaker 4: or Lebron James or didn't matter. Play could guard anyway.
Speaker 5: He passed stolen by Irving, Irving on the drive layup
Speaker 5: block by Thompson, right.
Speaker 4: Recovery for and so as a two way player. You know,
Speaker 4: Clay was just incredible, but the two of them offensively,
Speaker 4: it was a light show out there.
Speaker 6: Hurry with the revel.
Speaker 3: Finish inside, here's Andre.
Speaker 9: I think it goes beyond basketball. You know, you say
Speaker 9: guy or some mysterious ways. You look at their backgrounds.
Speaker 9: You know, you got two guys who grew up in
Speaker 9: the NBA and the NBA that they grew up in
Speaker 9: it was you know, it was hard nose.
Speaker 8: Uh.
Speaker 9: Clay grew up in Portland, step grew up in most
Speaker 9: of his time in Charlotte, spent a little bit of
Speaker 9: time in Toronto, where his dad played. And so when
Speaker 9: you grew up in the NBA household, one thing you're
Speaker 9: you know, an NBA parent will teach you is to
Speaker 9: find skills and fundamentals of the game and a big
Speaker 9: piece of that shooting. And you know every NBA player
Speaker 9: is like, the first thing you need to teach your
Speaker 9: kid is out of had a shooting touch.
Speaker 8: And dal was a great shooter.
Speaker 9: And then Mikey Time someone was a hard nose player
Speaker 9: who you know was around some great teams. And so
Speaker 9: you know their kids are going to understand great basketball.
Speaker 9: But beyond basketball, those two aren't really phased by fame.
Speaker 9: They aren't phased by the glitzon and glamour, and so
Speaker 9: the personality that they've grown to be isn't necessarily around
Speaker 9: like I love basketball for other reasons outside of basketball,
Speaker 9: Like they weren't forced to play the game. They didn't
Speaker 9: have to. They had so many other opportunities in front
Speaker 9: of them. Basketball wasn't their only option. And so you know,
Speaker 9: those two loved the game. You see the guys, they
Speaker 9: understand that they missed five threes in a row, the
Speaker 9: next was good. That's the confidence that's been breeded in
Speaker 9: them from growing up in the NBA.
Speaker 3: Kirs started his Golden State career by meeting with players
Speaker 3: one on one before training camp. He even flew to
Speaker 3: Australia to meet with center Andrew Bogan. He laid out
Speaker 3: his plan for each player. The trickiest was Iguadala.
Speaker 9: That was interesting times because that the previous summer was
Speaker 9: one of the first times in a couple of years
Speaker 9: that I was able to get healthy, get some rest
Speaker 9: and have a complete off season, just let my body heal.
Speaker 8: Like I said, that was completing year ten. I believe, Yeah,
Speaker 8: I think I.
Speaker 9: Just finished your tenth year nine or ten, and I
Speaker 9: had an operation on my quad at tendon and it
Speaker 9: kept me out of the plan with the World Championship
Speaker 9: team that summer, and I just let the body heal
Speaker 9: came back stronger than ever. I had a really good
Speaker 9: training camp. I never forget it. The training camp was
Speaker 9: one of the best training camps I had in a while.
Speaker 9: And I was coming to my own and I was
Speaker 9: really feeling myself like, all right, I'm probably gonna be
Speaker 9: one of the captains. Steph Curry's the guy, but you know,
Speaker 9: I'm looking to really come on strong and support him
Speaker 9: as you know, two or three option with what I
Speaker 9: thought I could bring to the team. And it was
Speaker 9: just a really good training camp. And I never forget
Speaker 9: the conversation. Steve went to Arizona. He was coached by
Speaker 9: Ludosen right, so his words are resonating with me through
Speaker 9: the entirety of training camp. You know, he has a
Speaker 9: different vocabulary, a different vernacular, and I picked up on it.
Speaker 9: You know, there's you there's a foreign language to verbage
Speaker 9: in the NBA. I picked up on everything he was saying.
Speaker 9: All the drills, I knew all about them. They were
Speaker 9: at Gludosa's drills or the fundamentals of things, and Steve's
Speaker 9: big on fundamentals, and I'm really feeling good about the situation,
Speaker 9: and Steve's explaining it and he's making all the sense
Speaker 9: in the world, but ultimately he's saying, I need you
Speaker 9: to make the ultimate sacrifice, which is a tall, a
Speaker 9: tall ask in the NBA world, because your salary is
Speaker 9: reflected in your positioning on the team, and so you
Speaker 9: want to be team first, but also understanding the business
Speaker 9: side and you have to maximize your window in time.
Speaker 9: So it was easy to understand and it was a
Speaker 9: hard trend, but it was a hard transition. And like
Speaker 9: you said, you know, things happen for a reason, and
Speaker 9: the ultimate sacrifice, you know, paid off.
Speaker 3: Andre Iguadala, nicknamed Iggy, had started the first seven hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty eight games of his career, but he would
Speaker 3: now become a sixth man. That was another decision that
Speaker 3: you made, having Iggy come off the bench and asking
Speaker 3: him to do so, which ended up being a brilliant decision.
Speaker 3: What was it like to have him on that squad
Speaker 3: and have a really really from the get go buy
Speaker 3: into pretty much everything you were doing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, it took It took a couple months. He
Speaker 4: wasn't thrilled. He wastably mature about it. Yeah. I talked
Speaker 4: to him about it in training camp. We shared the
Speaker 4: Loud Olsen connection. We both learned the game from coach Olsen,
Speaker 4: and so there was an inherent respect. We didn't know
Speaker 4: each other that well, but we shared that connection. And
Speaker 4: I think the biggest thing was Andre. It was in
Speaker 4: his tenth year. He had been an All Star, he
Speaker 4: had made you know, Max contract, He wanted to win
Speaker 4: a championship and the timing was right. We talked about
Speaker 4: it over multiple conversations, and my vision for him was,
Speaker 4: if we can start Harrison, it'll make him better, because
Speaker 4: Harrison needed the the space. And if we do that
Speaker 4: and we put you on the bench, it'll make the
Speaker 4: bench better because you can be Armano Ginobili, you know,
Speaker 4: our guy who's gonna get get everything said. And I
Speaker 4: gave him my spurs, you know, experience, and and I
Speaker 4: think he was willing to try it because it was
Speaker 4: the right timing and because he was an incredibly smart,
Speaker 4: mature player who understood. But honestly, it took him a
Speaker 4: couple of months. He struggles. He had never come off
Speaker 4: the bench his entire not a single game, and that's
Speaker 4: a tough adjustment to me. So it took a couple
Speaker 4: of months, but eventually he really thrived. He was closing
Speaker 4: games all the time.
Speaker 8: Right, So.
Speaker 3: What was it that you had to adjust to in
Speaker 3: a basketball sense coming off the bench?
Speaker 8: Really good question. Coming off the bench.
Speaker 9: Normally the first guy coming off the bench, you know,
Speaker 9: the balls in their hands, they're scoring. They're like the
Speaker 9: primary score other than any other starter, so they really
Speaker 9: like option three. You know, you got your first two
Speaker 9: options with your starting lineup, and then you got your
Speaker 9: role players around that. But usually your six man's the
Speaker 9: guy coming off the bench to scoring. You know, firepower
Speaker 9: in all terms of put the ball in the hole.
Speaker 9: But for me, Steve wanted me to find the flow
Speaker 9: and find the flow mint putting the extra pass in
Speaker 9: the game, making the right reads, you know, giving getting
Speaker 9: everyone on one accord. We're working on the string defensively,
Speaker 9: my voice, leadership, and so you know, those things don't
Speaker 9: show up on the stat sheet. And as a starter,
Speaker 9: you can kind of feel your way into the game
Speaker 9: and you can let it kind of come to you.
Speaker 9: But coming off the bench, you want to get right
Speaker 9: to it. But for me, it was going in game
Speaker 9: set of everyone down, get the ball flowing, and by
Speaker 9: the time I started to get a good rhythm, it
Speaker 9: was my time to come back out. Coming off the bench,
Speaker 9: you know, when you're starting the ball to find you,
Speaker 9: you'll get a shot here, shot there, the flow finds you.
Speaker 9: But coming off the bench, you got to like force
Speaker 9: it a little bit, especially if you're the number, if
Speaker 9: you're the scoring option off the bench, being a passing
Speaker 9: option off the bench, you know you might not get
Speaker 9: a shot until you know, right before your rotation comes
Speaker 9: out midway through the second quarter. And so as opposed
Speaker 9: to feeling my way through the game getting a couple
Speaker 9: of shots, like I may not find a shot or
Speaker 9: two in the first half, and then at halftime, I'm
Speaker 9: coming in personally like I didn't make an impression on
Speaker 9: the game, But coming from Steve, he was like, you know,
Speaker 9: you were perfect for me, Like your minutes were very
Speaker 9: valuable to me, And I know what he meant, and
Speaker 9: he knows that I know what he means. But like, hey, Steve,
Speaker 9: like I'm on year nine ten, career is coming to
Speaker 9: an end. Like if I don't put up some type
Speaker 9: of production for those who are paying folks.
Speaker 8: Can see it.
Speaker 9: I won't have a job soon, So it's just trying
Speaker 9: to find that balance too. But like I said, when
Speaker 9: you get to the finals, and this is what made
Speaker 9: me a true believer in just really trusting the game,
Speaker 9: the ball is going to be where it's supposed to be.
Speaker 9: And that's why I enjoyed the playoffs most. You know,
Speaker 9: like I can really shine. I knew the ball would
Speaker 9: do what it's supposed to do, and I could just
Speaker 9: trust the game, and it always finds those who are
Speaker 9: who have good intentions.
Speaker 6: Green lots it up and another nice pass from Green,
Speaker 6: who heats the team and assists.
Speaker 1: In fact, he's sixth in the NBA.
Speaker 6: And assists and Mike. When you commit to Curry like that,
Speaker 6: it's four on three. I don't think you can trap
Speaker 6: him on every possession. Green blocks Irving.
Speaker 3: You have David Lee, he's you know, integral part of
Speaker 3: the team and the team has invested a lot in him.
Speaker 3: And then he gets a hamstring injury during a game
Speaker 3: in November, and this guy named Raymond Green pops into
Speaker 3: the starting lineup as his replacement, and pretty soon after that,
Speaker 3: there's a sixteen game winning streak.
Speaker 1: What did he unlock in the team.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Draymond was I had no idea how good he was.
Speaker 4: I knew he was a good player, but I kind
Speaker 4: of looked at him when I got the job, as
Speaker 4: you know, he'll be like a you know, Swiss army knife,
Speaker 4: Like we can plug him in here and there and
Speaker 4: he can be And David Lee was an all star,
Speaker 4: so I had David plugged in, you know, starting power forward.
Speaker 4: When he got hurt, we put Draymond in that spot.
Speaker 4: And he was so good defensively.
Speaker 6: Second round pick by the way, Draymond dreen Is Curry
Speaker 6: tied up up the top. Green has excellent pree point range.
Speaker 8: Nails it.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah he does that too.
Speaker 4: But also he was so smart on offense. He unlocked
Speaker 4: a lot of things for us with his ball handling,
Speaker 4: with his passing, screening, the force that he played with.
Speaker 4: He was a tornado out there and he impacted the
Speaker 4: game in so many different ways. And poor David, I mean,
Speaker 4: you know, he he gets injured and fifteen games later
Speaker 4: we're like, I think we're I don't know, thirteen and
Speaker 4: two or something, and I pulled David aside, and I go, look,
Speaker 4: this is not your fault, like you've been an amazing player,
Speaker 4: but we're clicking with Raymond and we're gonna we're gonna
Speaker 4: stay with him. And David handled it as well as
Speaker 4: he possibly could. He was great, and he came back
Speaker 4: and helped us, you know, win games in the finals
Speaker 4: and helped us win a championship. But that was, you know,
Speaker 4: almost the Wealie Pip lou Gerritt moment.
Speaker 1: And it's like, you know, that's the obvious comparison. Yeah,
Speaker 1: here's Iggy.
Speaker 9: You know, you've seen a few guys like Draymond in
Speaker 9: the past, but not at the level of Draymond. Like
Speaker 9: I'll think about like a Chuck Hayes or even like
Speaker 9: a Dennis Robin, you know. And I say Chuck Hayes
Speaker 9: because he used to guard centers and he couldn't bag
Speaker 9: him down he was so strong. And then I say
Speaker 9: Dennis Robin because we aren't who Dennis Rodman is and
Speaker 9: Draymond being kind of both of those guys in turnos
Speaker 9: He's only six four sixty five.
Speaker 8: You can't back him down.
Speaker 9: Within his basketball IQ, his offensive ability to pass the
Speaker 9: ball and make Reed's being a smart player. He just
Speaker 9: set himself up for his own lane, like we've never
Speaker 9: seen a lane like Draymond Green.
Speaker 4: Got a little while Selen steph reebound in the motion,
Speaker 4: steph Harry.
Speaker 6: Is just highling up the assist.
Speaker 3: The Warriors reeled off a sixteen game winning streak and
Speaker 3: they're twenty one and two. Start to the season was
Speaker 3: their best in franchise history.
Speaker 4: Steph Urry.
Speaker 5: So back to back threes for the Warriors in a
Speaker 5: nice beginning.
Speaker 1: So we're talking about coming off the bench.
Speaker 3: I mean we're talking about Andre you know, Clay coming
Speaker 3: off the bench this year, David Lee losing his starting job.
Speaker 3: I mean for somebody to have the perspective that you do,
Speaker 3: understanding coming from a world where it is one through twelve, right,
Speaker 3: understanding that you can come off the bench and change
Speaker 3: the course of the game and that what you do
Speaker 3: can win a championship. How much do you think that
Speaker 3: your playing experience in that regard impacted the way that
Speaker 3: you viewed this team, your approach to the game, and
Speaker 3: what you were trying to sell to the players.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think my playing experience really informed me and
Speaker 4: helped me connect with the guys on the bench because
Speaker 4: I had been there and I knew exactly what they
Speaker 4: were going through. And in a lot of ways, I
Speaker 4: have a harder time understanding what Steph and Draymond and
Speaker 4: Clay go through, you know, because they're stars and they
Speaker 4: have I never played that role, and they have a
Speaker 4: totally different set of circumstances and pressures that they deal with.
Speaker 4: So in a lot of ways, I've always connected with
Speaker 4: bench guys. But I think, then you guys listen to
Speaker 4: me because they know that I was one of them,
Speaker 4: and I will share my experiences with them and remind
Speaker 4: them of how important they can be and what a
Speaker 4: crucial role they can play.
Speaker 3: The bench became a lethal weapon. By mid January, the
Speaker 3: Warriors reserves averaged over thirty five points a game and
Speaker 3: accounted for sixty seven points in a win over Denver.
Speaker 3: Just after mid season, the Warriors bench ranked first, and
Speaker 3: field goal percentage in blocks second, and assists and steals
Speaker 3: top ten in scoring.
Speaker 1: You get the idea.
Speaker 3: The bench was really, really good, and it allowed Kerr
Speaker 3: to limit Stephan Clay's minutes, keeping them fresh for the
Speaker 3: coming playoff runs.
Speaker 7: Numbers here to five on three hurried down the lane
Speaker 7: play for three.
Speaker 3: Another factor for the Warriors home court advantage the Oracle Center,
Speaker 3: the city of Oakland, Dog Nation was in love with
Speaker 3: their team.
Speaker 4: Curry again, there was there was just a buzz in
Speaker 4: the building that actually I felt even when I was
Speaker 4: a player and I would play against the Warriors and
Speaker 4: the Warriors weren't even any good, but there was a
Speaker 4: buzz in the building because people in Oakland loved basketballers.
Speaker 4: You know, deep basketball history in the Bay Area, you know,
Speaker 4: going back to Bill Russell at USF, but you know,
Speaker 4: going back to the Warriors, you know, with Rick Berry
Speaker 4: and Al Addles and seventy five. There's always been an
Speaker 4: amazing love for basketball. So that year, walking into Oracle
Speaker 4: every day and the fans sensing that something special was happening,
Speaker 4: there was just an electricity that you could feel.
Speaker 9: You know, you look at Steph's commercials nowadays and you
Speaker 9: know Stephan is dancing, you know his vibes, and when
Speaker 9: you see the dance and it has the Oakland bop
Speaker 9: to it, you know, it has an open rhythm to it.
Speaker 9: And I just said, you know, you talk about the town,
Speaker 9: the town being on our jerseys the last few there,
Speaker 9: the last few years being in Oracle. The energy, you know,
Speaker 9: even playing in the series when I was in Denver,
Speaker 9: like I had really good games of Oracle. Just the
Speaker 9: energy in there, and you know, talking to KD when
Speaker 9: he came in, he was like, no, this is one
Speaker 9: of my favorite arenas to play in. It was a
Speaker 9: basketball arena. The depth perception was perfect, the experience was perfect,
Speaker 9: and then the fan base, like it was electric in there,
Speaker 9: and like you just couldn't wait to play at home
Speaker 9: in ourca, Like it's a shooters gym and you got
Speaker 9: some of the greatest shooters, and so it was just
Speaker 9: the vibe was just there. The community has always been
Speaker 9: supportive even in their down times, and it could have
Speaker 9: been a perfect, a better situation in terms of, you know,
Speaker 9: the culture we built with the team, the fan base,
Speaker 9: the city, the vibes, you know, the weather.
Speaker 8: It was just it was amazing.
Speaker 3: On January twenty first, the Warriors established a new franchise
Speaker 3: record seventeenth straight home wins. Two nights later, on the
Speaker 3: twenty third, in a game against the Kings at the Oracle,
Speaker 3: Klay Thompson set a record, scoring an unbelievable thirty seven
Speaker 3: points in the third quarter.
Speaker 1: Forty nine get it to it again. He's gotten it.
Speaker 1: Wills three.
Speaker 8: Kets.
Speaker 3: You called that thirty seven point quarter religious experience, I recall, yeah.
Speaker 4: It really was. It was. I think it might be
Speaker 4: my favorite basketball moment I've ever had in my life.
Speaker 4: It was so bizarre, it was so surreal, and obviously
Speaker 4: winning championships is amazing, you know, so I'm not trying
Speaker 4: to diminish the feeling of winning a championship, but the
Speaker 4: surreal nature of Clay scoring thirty seven points, it was
Speaker 4: like the fans were involved. They were so it was
Speaker 4: like everybody was mesmerized it Clays in this trance. Nobody
Speaker 4: can believe what they're seeing, and it kept going and
Speaker 4: going and going in the buzz in oracle. Was it
Speaker 4: was unlike anything I'd ever felt because it was so
Speaker 4: unique and so incredibly just unbelievable, Like I know, it
Speaker 4: just couldn't have that couldn't happen, and yet it did.
Speaker 4: And then you had Steph running up and down the sidelines,
Speaker 4: you know, look of disbelief in his eyes. To this day,
Speaker 4: it's my favorite basketball moment.
Speaker 3: And Golden State could switch it up with their so
Speaker 3: called death lineup replacing seven foot center Andrew Boget with
Speaker 3: the versatile forward six foot six andre Iguodala.
Speaker 9: It looks like a small lineup, but when you look
Speaker 9: at it on the perimeter, we were a little bit
Speaker 9: bigger than most teams on the perimeter. Now the league had,
Speaker 9: you know, we got two prolific shooters and Stephan Clay
Speaker 9: changing the game. The NBA's trending towards that anyway, and
Speaker 9: so you start seeing two small guard lineups where it's
Speaker 9: like the NFL, you have two running backs where you
Speaker 9: can have two smaller guys, meaning like a guy that's
Speaker 9: six ' to one another guy that's sixty three on
Speaker 9: a four at the same time, where step is really
Speaker 9: six three sixty four, like he's a big point guard.
Speaker 9: People may not realize that about him because he's around
Speaker 9: giants all the time. And then Klay Thompson is six
Speaker 9: seven at the two. I remember playing the Boston Celtics
Speaker 9: and I guarded I was guarding it in one possession.
Speaker 9: I guarded Rondo, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce and kg all
Speaker 9: in the same possession, you know, just switching and all
Speaker 9: those things. So I had already seen it before, you know,
Speaker 9: I had already been through that in my career as
Speaker 9: a defensive guy.
Speaker 3: The Warriors had electric moments that season. In March, right
Speaker 3: around the time I shot the ESPN special, Steph dribbled
Speaker 3: around four Clippers defenders and step back for a three.
Speaker 6: Curry slips the leaf of behind the back fires at track.
Speaker 6: A spectacular moment, but it's still Longe, just.
Speaker 4: Live and I turn around and I'm holding my head
Speaker 4: like what are you doing? Yes, you know, and then
Speaker 4: laugh at and that's you know, that's my point. I mean,
Speaker 4: it just it took some time because he really did
Speaker 4: change the game. And you know when people say that,
Speaker 4: it's really it's not hyperbole. He changed the game. He
Speaker 4: changed what was a good shot, and for great shooters
Speaker 4: like Steph, and there aren't many like him, but Clay
Speaker 4: was very similar. A quick transition three, even off the dribble,
Speaker 4: had always been considered a bad shot. To that point.
Speaker 4: Steph changed that play, changed that. It's now the shot
Speaker 4: you're looking for transition three, Like how quickly can you
Speaker 4: get the ball up the floor, Because a wide open three,
Speaker 4: or even a contested three from a great shooter is
Speaker 4: now a great shot.
Speaker 3: The Warriors finished that season with the league best record,
Speaker 3: sixty seven and fifteen tyme the franchise record for road
Speaker 3: wins with twenty four. Steph Curry was named the NBA MVP.
Speaker 2: It's also particularly special that you're the first player in
Speaker 2: fifty five years as a Warrior, the Windy Aster. I'm
Speaker 2: the last one overboard Will Chamberlain. So you're a very
Speaker 2: special company. So it's my honor and my pleasure to
Speaker 2: present you Steph Curry with the two thousand, fourteen fifteen
Speaker 2: Kia MVP Award.
Speaker 3: In the playoffs, the Warriors got off to a fast start,
Speaker 3: sweeping the Anthony Davis led New Orleans Pelicans in round one.
Speaker 6: Curry to Green, Green fights Curry, gorgeous steeve seventh assist
Speaker 6: for Trayvon Green. Such a good passer, Curry.
Speaker 1: It's a Green greed drive speed lazer.
Speaker 3: They took down the Grizzlies in six games in the
Speaker 3: second round. The headline from that series ultimately was Curry.
Speaker 8: Green weaving, try to get a shot up. No call
Speaker 8: that way. Curry plays it the other way.
Speaker 3: In those playoffs, you had beaten you beat Memphis in six,
Speaker 3: but at one point you lost back to back. I mean,
Speaker 3: you had to get back on track. Right, And the
Speaker 3: real headline from that series was, Steph, it was a
Speaker 3: sixty two footer at the end of the third quarter
Speaker 3: in Game six.
Speaker 1: Just take us into that moment.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so we we had been down to to one
Speaker 4: and then we won the next two and kind of
Speaker 4: took control of the series. And we really had control
Speaker 4: of Game six. We were playing well comfortable, you know,
Speaker 4: twelve fourteen point lead. That was back in the time
Speaker 4: when that actually was a big lead, unlike.
Speaker 1: Exactly disappear right.
Speaker 3: Later.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks to you, by the way, and Steph, thanks
Speaker 1: to you guys.
Speaker 4: But what I remember is Memphis and they were good.
Speaker 4: They were tough, you know, physical team, Zach Randolph and Marcasol.
Speaker 4: They were started to pound us inside and they cut
Speaker 4: the lead I think to six near the end of
Speaker 4: the third and there was it was was it a
Speaker 4: jump ball? It might have been a jump ball in
Speaker 4: our on our end of the court. You know, there's
Speaker 4: only a couple of seconds left. And Steph, who was
Speaker 4: the only person I had ever known who took every
Speaker 4: half court shot, you know, every three quarter shot like never.
Speaker 4: You know, most guys in the league they wait that
Speaker 4: extra half second, like I don't want my shooting percentage
Speaker 4: to Steph didn't he didn't care, and he would take
Speaker 4: every half court shot and in this case, it was
Speaker 4: a three quarter court shot. And I just remember the
Speaker 4: wind getting knocked out of the Grizzlies stomachs. You know
Speaker 4: that the whole arena went silent, and it went from
Speaker 4: six to nine or seven to ten, something like that,
Speaker 4: and I don't think they ever threatened again. That was
Speaker 4: the key shot. And man, what an amazing moment.
Speaker 3: After Memphis, the Warriors dispatched James Harden's Houston Rockets in
Speaker 3: five games in the Western Conference Finals.
Speaker 5: It was hard going again, Fines Curry's quick release on
Speaker 5: the three as got it, I lost it again.
Speaker 6: There comes Egadala all alone.
Speaker 3: The Doves advanced to their first NBA Finals since last
Speaker 3: winning the title in nineteen seventy five, facing Lebron James Cavaliers,
Speaker 3: sparking a fierce rivalry that would play out over the next.
Speaker 1: Three NBA Finals.
Speaker 3: What do you think in the end, you spoke about
Speaker 3: the death lineup, But how did you guys? What was
Speaker 3: the biggest challenge that you overcame and why do you
Speaker 3: think you overcame it and were able to win those
Speaker 3: finals and do so on the run.
Speaker 4: Well, Lebron was just so good still is, but you know,
Speaker 4: right in his prime, coming off multiple championships in Miami
Speaker 4: Force of Nature. I think the reason we won was
Speaker 4: because we had an incredible roster and what Bob Myers
Speaker 4: built and Joe Lake of our organization, you know, the
Speaker 4: foundation that they had built gave us multiple defenders so
Speaker 4: much versatility that we could kind of play any style.
Speaker 4: And when you combine that with the character and the
Speaker 4: quality of our our players, our people, steph and Clay
Speaker 4: and Draymond, Andre, all these guys who were so committed
Speaker 4: to winning, Andre making the sacrifice to come off the bench,
Speaker 4: the players adapting and adjusting to whatever decisions we made
Speaker 4: in the playoffs. They were all in. Everybody was all in.
Speaker 4: And the ability to bring Andre back into the starting lineup,
Speaker 4: put him on Lebron James, you know, take Clay off
Speaker 4: of him, take Harrison off of him, let those guys free.
Speaker 4: It changed everything. But you can only do that if
Speaker 4: you have an incredible roster and great character, high character players,
Speaker 4: and we had that.
Speaker 3: After Golden State fell behind two to one in the series,
Speaker 3: Kerr went to the death lineup right away, giving Iggy
Speaker 3: his first start of the season, replacing Boget in Game
Speaker 3: four in the.
Speaker 4: Finals, when you know, Cleveland was beating us to one
Speaker 4: and we were struggling to score and we needed to
Speaker 4: change change things up. And you know, the irony of
Speaker 4: going to Andre and saying, okay, we need you to
Speaker 4: start again and having him not only thrive but become
Speaker 4: Finals MVP. It was kind of like, Okay, this is
Speaker 4: validation that sacrifice works, you know, and you know, the
Speaker 4: guy who made the main sacrifice for the team gets
Speaker 4: Finals MVP. Like every coach's dream is for something like
Speaker 4: that to happen because it's validation for what you're trying
Speaker 4: to sell to the group all year long. So that
Speaker 4: was an incredible moment.
Speaker 5: Games Spins, pivots stripped stolen by Igodala. Here's Curry, Andre
Speaker 5: Igodala with another fine defensive player. That leads to it
Speaker 5: easy two points another feet inside of Curry.
Speaker 3: So you go to the NBA Finals, you match up
Speaker 3: against the Calves, You're matched up against Lebron James.
Speaker 1: You guys, are they have they have a two to
Speaker 1: one lead.
Speaker 3: I mean at that point Lebron was like averaging forty
Speaker 3: one points through three games, so kind of take me
Speaker 3: through the adjustments. In game four, here comes the death
Speaker 3: line up at you in particular because you had, you know,
Speaker 3: the toughest job out there.
Speaker 9: Well, I think it was game three where we lost
Speaker 9: but we found something in the second half. We something
Speaker 9: and we had we went on the run. Now we
Speaker 9: didn't complete the run and we didn't win the game.
Speaker 9: But I think, you know, you play hard every minute
Speaker 9: of the way for a reason.
Speaker 8: You know.
Speaker 9: That's why I'm not too upset by teams who still
Speaker 9: try to execute and run their plays even if they're
Speaker 9: up big in the games. You know, as long as
Speaker 9: you're not trying to run up the score, but you're
Speaker 9: trying to execute, you get something out of every minute.
Speaker 9: I tell young guys, go in the game, finish the
Speaker 9: game as hard as you can. Like something might click.
Speaker 9: You know, you might hit the right shot at the
Speaker 9: right time. Coach might see you're always ready and put
Speaker 9: you in the game next game. So in that moment,
Speaker 9: we saw something. And my friend Clark Miyasaki, who I
Speaker 9: saw right after the game, and we were talking. He
Speaker 9: was in Cleveland, and I said, man, I think we
Speaker 9: found something. I think we got ball.
Speaker 5: Buober Agadala hesn't been to shoot now, Curry not and
Speaker 5: HiT's the three pointer. The extra pass for.
Speaker 4: Megadala cannot give them any ass pace.
Speaker 5: Bigadala left open, makes a joke and knocks down the shot.
Speaker 9: And we saw someone with that small lineup that it
Speaker 9: was like, okay, they don't have a threat offensively under
Speaker 9: the basket, which enables us to go small.
Speaker 8: And so we saw something there.
Speaker 9: In game four, we knew we had it, and we
Speaker 9: knew we were you know, we go back home and
Speaker 9: win it, and then obviously you have three two just
Speaker 9: you know, the toss up of a game six and
Speaker 9: trying to close them out.
Speaker 1: The lineup was the death of the Cavaliers.
Speaker 3: The Warriors won the last three games and their first
Speaker 3: NBA championship in forty years.
Speaker 6: Rebound Curry and the dream season is now complete.
Speaker 1: The Golden State Warriors.
Speaker 6: Are the twenty fifteen NBA champions.
Speaker 3: Did you have any sense when you beat the Cavaliers
Speaker 3: for that first title that this was something that could
Speaker 3: happen again and again? What was your initial reaction upon
Speaker 3: winning the title and then how soon did it take
Speaker 3: you to start thinking, listen, we can we can run
Speaker 3: this back. This is this is really something special because
Speaker 3: you had been a part of that Bulls dynasty. I
Speaker 3: mean you understood, you know, you had been with the
Speaker 3: Spurs perennial contenders, so you know, I'm pretty sure you
Speaker 3: could recognize a very special squad when you saw it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you know, we weren't sure we could
Speaker 4: do it during the season, but you know, I was
Speaker 4: trying to convince the guys that we could. Once we did,
Speaker 4: my first thought was, we can do this again, because
Speaker 4: my experience with Chicago and San Antonio was once you
Speaker 4: know you can do it, in some ways, it's easier
Speaker 4: to do it the next time. You have a deeper
Speaker 4: sense of confidence and on a level of trust of
Speaker 4: each other. Now, the flip side is it's exhausting. There's
Speaker 4: there's kind of this sweet spot where I think, this
Speaker 4: the year after you win the title, that's your best
Speaker 4: shot to go in another one because you're on this high.
Speaker 4: You have this amazing confidence. But once you start stacking
Speaker 4: season after season on top of one another, it gets
Speaker 4: physically and emotionally so exhausting that it gets harder. So
Speaker 4: I thought, ironically, I thought our best shot will be
Speaker 4: next year We're gonna win next year too, Like I
Speaker 4: really believe that it could have.
Speaker 2: Been a lot of these guys, but there can only
Speaker 2: be one.
Speaker 1: MVP, and andre Iguodala made history.
Speaker 2: And this year's MVP is a player who didn't start
Speaker 2: in a single game until these Finals. This year's Bill
Speaker 2: Russell MVP, andre Iguodala.
Speaker 3: You are named Finals MVP, the first player in NBA
Speaker 3: history to win that title without starting a game during
Speaker 3: the regular season.
Speaker 1: What did that mean to you?
Speaker 9: I think I was more just shocked and just overjoy
Speaker 9: winning a championship. And I think that's the greatest joy
Speaker 9: when you win a championship is not knowing what the
Speaker 9: hell was going on or what to do after the
Speaker 9: buzzer goes off, Like you know, I saw that step
Speaker 9: through the ball in the air, and I don't know,
Speaker 9: my mind went to follow the ball and catch it,
Speaker 9: and I remember like three or four teammates were like
Speaker 9: hugging me and chase me around, and I'm like, get
Speaker 9: off me, and I'm running around.
Speaker 8: I don't know which way to go, and I'm like,
Speaker 8: no way this is happening.
Speaker 9: You know, you spend your whole career two of days,
Speaker 9: three days in the summer, you know, going through you know,
Speaker 9: the nonsense of the things you have to deal with
Speaker 9: being a professional athlete, the traumas of things, you know,
Speaker 9: all the things you're dealing on and off the court,
Speaker 9: and the ultimate goal of being a champion is a
Speaker 9: lot harder than people can understand. It's some people never
Speaker 9: get to the playoffs.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 9: Some guys never get an opportunity to you know, get
Speaker 9: to the second round or even just even look at
Speaker 9: the finals. And I never had the opportunity to look
Speaker 9: at the finals and for us to you know, do
Speaker 9: what we did. Uh, the game planning and sacrifice. The
Speaker 9: MVP was just chising on the cake. Like I wasn't
Speaker 9: expecting it. I was really surprised, you know, Bob Myers
Speaker 9: let me know, and I really didn't not hurt them,
Speaker 9: but and I wasn't thinking about it. I'm like, all right,
Speaker 9: that's cool and all. But we just won a championship.
Speaker 9: So it was really really about the team.
Speaker 3: As you look back on the Warriors and the multiple titles,
Speaker 3: and that tag dynasty certainly applies to Golden State. Is
Speaker 3: that something that you envisioned at the time that you
Speaker 3: won that first title?
Speaker 9: Yeah, well, I mean after you win the first one,
Speaker 9: I think our group was special when we understood, you know,
Speaker 9: the opportunity that was ahead of us, and we're a
Speaker 9: very competitive group, and so we wanted to prove that
Speaker 9: the first time wasn't the Fluke Steward again. You know,
Speaker 9: once you get to my age, once you get there,
Speaker 9: it's like I don't want to go anywhere else but here.
Speaker 9: You know, your splash brothers, who are you know now
Speaker 9: they want to really make their mark on the league.
Speaker 8: Like all right, we here.
Speaker 9: You know, we're the top two guar combo in the
Speaker 9: league and we're going to stay here for the next
Speaker 9: ten years. Then you got like dre Mine is like
Speaker 9: always the doubted one and he has a chip on
Speaker 9: his shoulders, but at the same time like being who
Speaker 9: he is. It's a perfect scenario for him to really
Speaker 9: be who he naturally is and can really express himself
Speaker 9: in a manner where that takes his game to a
Speaker 9: higher level.
Speaker 8: Like you don't want to get in his way.
Speaker 9: You know, you got a guy like that, you don't
Speaker 9: want to try to tain for lack a better word, him,
Speaker 9: You got to let him be who he is in
Speaker 9: order for him to really go out there and produce
Speaker 9: at the level that he's done his entire career and
Speaker 9: creating his own lane. And then, like I said before,
Speaker 9: Harrison Barnes, young guy. You know, he's trying to build
Speaker 9: his own lane as well. And then the bench we
Speaker 9: had was just amazing. You know, myself, Sean Limison and
Speaker 9: I have been playing basketball against each other since we
Speaker 9: were eleven years old. Wow, So so we go way back,
Speaker 9: and you know what he went through in his career
Speaker 9: and coming back and then he was really a staple
Speaker 9: and his fabric is really built into the cough of
Speaker 9: the culture that we built.
Speaker 8: Barbosa was amazing for us.
Speaker 9: You know, we just had everyone looked out for one another,
Speaker 9: and you know, it's really hard to build teams and
Speaker 9: culture like that.
Speaker 1: Here's Steve.
Speaker 4: I've been incredibly lucky. And obviously with the talent too.
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, to coach Steph Curry and and
Speaker 4: Raymond Clay and Andre and all these guys, I mean,
Speaker 4: it's I was set up for success.
Speaker 3: Under Steve's leadership, the Warriors have won four titles and
Speaker 3: made six trips to the NBA Finals.
Speaker 4: In hindsight, it's obvious with the talent, and then as
Speaker 4: you coach and you realize, oh wow, I don't have
Speaker 4: nearly as much control as I thought I might. You know,
Speaker 4: when you really get into coaching and you realize that
Speaker 4: you know how powerless you can be. And then the
Speaker 4: other thing is guys like Steph Curry are once in
Speaker 4: a generation human beings. There's there's so few. Tim Duncan
Speaker 4: was very similar to Steph. And you know Pop, when
Speaker 4: I have dinner with Pop, when he has dinner with anybody,
Speaker 4: he starts every dinner with a toast to Tim dunt To.
Speaker 1: This day, you're kidding, no matter what the context.
Speaker 4: Context, Poorzwan. He goes, here's Tim Duncan, and it's Pop's
Speaker 4: way of saying, you know, we are all so dependent
Speaker 4: on the character and the talent of our best players,
Speaker 4: and that's coaching in the NBA. And he was so
Speaker 4: lucky to have Tim. Tim allowed him to have this
Speaker 4: run that he's been on. And I would say the
Speaker 4: exact same thing about Steph. So we're lucky.
Speaker 1: Next time.
Speaker 3: On the final episode of NBA DNA, David Storm and
Speaker 3: The Inside Stuff. NBA DNA with Hannah Storm is a
Speaker 3: production of iHeart Podcasts. The NBA and Brainstorm in Productions.
Speaker 3: The show is written and executive produced by me Hannah
Speaker 3: Storm along with Julia Weaver and Alex French. Our lead
Speaker 3: producer and showrunner is Julia Weaver. Our senior producers are
Speaker 3: Peter Cauder, Alex French, and Brandon Reese. Editing and sound
Speaker 3: design by Kurt Garn and Julia Weaver. The show's executive
Speaker 3: producers are Carmen Belmont, Jason English, Sean t Tone, Steve Weintraup,
Speaker 3: and Jason Weikelt