As the Golden State Warriors lost to the Milwaukee Bucks on Thursday night, 120-110, it came without the opponent having star Giannis Antetokounmpo. While some could consider that the Warriors have dominated with players such as Jimmy Butler and Stephen Curry, among others, there's no denying that the conversation around load management is present.
Recently, basketball legend Michael Jordan would say that load management is not needed in a recent NBC interview, but Golden State head coach Steve Kerr would argue with that point. While understanding the position, he would talk about players he has on his team, like Curry, Butler, and even Draymond Green and Al Horford.
“For us, four of our top guys are 35-39,” Kerr said, according to The Athletic. “We now have performance teams. When I played with the Bulls, we had one trainer and one weight coach. And now we have reams of data (from) our performance team, which is comprised of 10 people or so.”
“They’re advising me when our guys are more vulnerable to injury,” Kerr continued. “I believe in this stuff. I believe in the science, and I believe in having players healthy for the playoffs. And if you can try to get there, and it means resting guys along the way, then I’m all for doing so because that’s what counts come playoff time. I don’t think there’s any exact data that can predict every injury, but I do think that there are patterns that we can see, that the experts can see, that can help us navigate through the season.”
Warriors' Steve Kerr on the 82-game schedule
With the Warriors having a dominant start to the season, despite the loss to the Bucks, Kerr would be asked about how defense is played in this era. When speaking about it, he mentioned how teams operate differently in an 82-game schedule, especially with all the traveling.
“This will be our sixth game in 10 games in four cities. Next 10, I think eight of them are on the road. When all is said and done, of our first 15 games, I think they’ll come in 26 days in 10 different cities,” Kerr said. ” To ask our players to sprint, either full court pressure, either dealing with it, or applying it, racing out to the 3-point line, covering 3-point shooters, and then playing at this tempo is dramatically different from what it was 20 years ago.”
At any rate, Golden State is 4-2 as the team next takes on the Indiana Pacers on Saturday.
