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<\/p>\nGolden State Warriors third-year forward Jonathan Kuminga is in the midst of a career year. But he feels he is more than capable of playing more than 21.7 minutes and averaging 12.5 points per game.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cMe with the ball,\u201d Kuminga told The Athletic\u2019s Marcus Thompson II, \u201cNobody\u2019s guarding me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut sometimes,\u201d Kuminga added, \u201cI\u2019ve gotta take that away to make sure my OGs get the ball. That\u2019s where it\u2019s confusing. Sometimes, I come out of the game not knowing what I did. And that messes with my head. It\u2019s like, \u2018What do they want me to do?\u2019 I can pass and I can do different s\u2014.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what happened when Andrew Wiggins returned after missing two games. The veteran Wiggins cut into Kuminga\u2019s minutes, especially in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n
Andrew Wiggins Over Jonathan Kuminga<\/strong> That was the case during their 120-114 loss to defending champion Denver Nuggets on Christmas Day.<\/p>\n Wiggins rewarded Kerr\u2019s faith with 12 of his 22 points in the fourth quarter as he repeatedly took advantage of the smaller Jamal Murray.<\/p>\n But the Warriors fell short because they went cold outside, hitting only 1 of 11 3-pointers in the fourth quarter. The \u201cSplash Brothers\u201d \u2014 Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson \u2014 were a combined 6 of 23 from deep, including 1 of 8 in the fourth quarter, in the loss.<\/p>\n Kuminga, who did not attempt a basket during his more than three minutes of court time in the fourth quarter, felt he could have helped attacking the gaps on Nuggets defense.<\/p>\n Just as he did in the first three quarters when he scored 13 points on 4 of 8 shooting and 5 of 8 from the free throw line.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah, I am a difference-maker,\u201d Kuminga told Thompson II. \u201cI know I am. But it\u2019s not up to me to do certain things. How can I say it? It\u2019s not up to me to control my minutes. I feel like I\u2019ve done that. But the last voice ain\u2019t mine. And it\u2019s not easy because I know how to score the basketball. I know how to pass. I know how to do different things on the floor. But it\u2019s about putting all that together. With the people we have on the floor, it\u2019s just tough to put it all together. I\u2019m trying to figure out how to manage that.\u201d<\/p>\n In short, he is pointing his fingers at Kerr for holding him back. The five-time champion coach, who is having a difficult time shuffling this deep Warriors roster, refuses to play Wiggins and Kuminga together.<\/p>\n Kuminga ended up playing 23 minutes to Wiggins\u2019 29 on Christmas Day. It was Kuminga\u2019s shortest leash since a 19-minute stint in a 118-114 win over Portland on December 17.<\/p>\n Steve Kerr Blasts Officiating<\/strong> His focus was on the league\u2019s officiating, which allowed two-time MVP Nikola Jokic to make a career-high 18 of 18 free throws, including 14 in the second half.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no problem with the officials themselves,\u201d Kerr said in his postgame press conference. \u201cAll across the league, we have really good officials. I have a problem with the way we are legislating defense out of the game. That\u2019s what we\u2019re doing in the NBA. The way we are teaching the officials, we\u2019re just enabling players to BS their way to the foul line.\u201d<\/p>\n The Warriors\u2019 defense did a tremendous job holding Jokic to a measly 4 of 12 shooting from the floor. But the 18 free throws hurt them the most.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Golden State Warriors third-year forward Jonathan Kuminga is in the midst of a career year. But he feels he is more than capable of playing more than… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":75121,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nDespite removing Wiggins from the starting lineup, Warriors coach Steve Kerr still leaned on the veteran in their closing lineup.<\/p>\n
\nKuminga\u2019s gripes were the least of Kerr\u2019s concerns following the loss that snapped their five-game winning streak.<\/p>\n