On the latest episode of the Gil’s Arena podcast, Gilbert Arenas and Kenyon Martin criticized Steve Kerr for his strategy of leaving Jaylen Brown wide open during the latest Boston Celtics-Golden State Warriors clash. According to the two former NBA players, multiple players in the league can be dared to shoot open shots. However, $300 million making Brown cannot be one of them.
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During the Golden State Warriors’ latest clash against the Boston Celtics, Steve Kerr implemented a unique strategy. Kerr instructed Draymond Green to sag off Jaylen Brown at the three-point line and focus on defending the paint instead.
The defensive approach fell apart in the first quarter itself. With open looks at the basket, Brown drilled five three-pointers in the first period, allowing the Celtics to take a 44-22 lead in the opening quarter. Eventually, the Boston Celtics managed to capitalize on the momentum and grabbed a huge 140-88 win.
The panel of Gil’s Arena reacted to the Warriors’ defensive approach. Gilbert Arenas believes that the strategy will only be beneficial if you implement it on different players and “not the dude who makes $300 million”. Kenyon Martin also mocked the idea of leaving Jaylen Brown open. Instead, Martin stated that he would use the same strategy on Draymond Green. Arenas captioned the same clip:
“Steve Kerr said we ain’t guardin’ the 2ND BEST GUY on the BEST TEAM IN THE EAST who makes 300 MILLION ,” Arenas mocked Kerr.
Arenas and Martin aren’t wrong. While Steve Kerr is one of the best coaches in the modern NBA, he did make a huge blunder by daring Brown to attempt open shots… especially when Brown is shooting a career-best 50.2% FG.
Steve Kerr explained why he dared Jaylen Brown to shoot
Following the Golden State Warriors’ 52-point blowout loss against the Boston Celtics, Steve Kerr explained why he chose the strategy of daring Jaylen Brown to take open shots. Kerr had the idea of “trying different things”. But clearly, that didn’t work well.
“You try different things. You pick your matchups. We wanted Draymond to be able to help on drives and make sure we weren’t giving up easy stuff in the paint. The killer was in transition, from the beginning of the game to the end,” Kerr explained.
In merely 22 minutes, thanks to the open looks that he was gifted, Jaylen Brown finished the contest with 29 points on 57.% from the field and 50% from the three-point field.
During the postgame conference, the 27-year-old revealed his reaction to the defensive strategy. While he didn’t take it personally, Brown was ready to take advantage of the fact that the opposition didn’t respect his long-range shooting.
“For the most part, my job is to get to the paint. I don’t take a lot of threes because we have enough of that,” Brown said. “But if you want to dare me to shoot, we can do that too. I thought it was a little disrespectful, but we took advantage of it and we didn’t look back.”
“I’m sure they thought that’s what their best chance was, or whoever came up with their defensive concept. So, it’s not personal. It was a little disrespectful to me, but you know, it is what is,” he said.
After Jaylen Brown’s highly efficient performance, it is pretty safe to assume that no team in the league would try using the same strategy as the Golden State Warriors.
