It feels rare to see more than one carrying call in an NBA game. But three? On the same player? Now that’s bizarre.
That’s what happened on Wednesday night in Miami, when Jordan Poole was called for three carrying violations.
The three plays are caught below.
The decision to officiate Poole’s dribbling that way confounded Steve Kerr. Kerr didn’t disagree with the letter of the law, but the fact that carrying is part of the modern NBA.
The Warriors head coach joined Tolbert and Copes on Wednesday to discuss the situation.
“There are six carries in every game and it’s never called and then for three to be called on one player, two of the plays, which have nothing to do with gaining an advantage,” Kerr said. “Jordan was just dribbling the ball to the side to get us in our offense and they called two carries. That was bizarre, because, I mean, you can nitpick that every game and call 15 of them. I would say in my nine years of coaching, I would, on average, say there’s one carry called every 10 games or so. It was just really weird. I still don’t really know what happened.”
Part of the confusion, Kerr said, is that the league has historically been very open in its communication about rule changes and emphases.
He called it a “painstaking” effort to create change, saying all changes go through committees and trial runs, usually in the G-League, with officials coming to teams to discuss how changes might manifest.
Kerr also pointed to history and Allen Iverson, referencing that the league used to officiate carrying as an “automatic violation.” Iverson changed the league, making carrying legal because, as Kerr said, his crossovers were, “… so spectacular to watch that the league just didn’t really want to take that away from an entertainment standpoint.”
Since that point, players have obviously taken advantage of being able to carry the ball and use that Iverson crossover in their reportoire.
“So for the last 30 years, I mean, the entire ball-handling repertoire of every player has completely changed to accommodate the allowance of carrying and so I mean, every young player now has the Iverson crossover – through the legs, carry it and then crossover or carry it and keep going the same direction,” Kerr said. “It’s really hard to guard, but it’s also provided a ton of entertainment for the league. So I think the league has always sort of had a difficult time with this, but we just need to know why last night was all of a sudden called out.”
It seems the suddenness of the decision to officiate carrying took the Warriors and Poole by surprise.
Kerr’s issue seems to be a lack of clarity on why the league has suddenly decide to enforce the rule against him, and whether that will continue going forward.
Listen to the full interview below. You can listen to every KNBR interview on our podcast page at knbr.com/podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Catch Tolbert & Copes weekdays from 2 p.m. – 6 p.m. on KNBR 104.5 / 680 and streaming live on KNBR.com.