The Warriors cannot afford another spotlight dud from Jordan Poole if they are going to beat the Boston Celtics in these NBA Finals.
At the very least, they can’t afford for him to play like he did in Thursday night’s 120-108 loss with any regularity.
They certainly cannot afford that on Sunday, in what has suddenly become a must-win Game 2.
Poole put in a stinker of a performance in the series opener.
Poole tallied 9 points on 2-of-7 shooting and 1-of-5 from three, with 2 rebounds, 2 assists and 4 turnovers. He was not close the sole reason the Warriors blew a 15-point lead and were run out of their own building to a stunned-to-silence Chase Center crowd.
But if Poole had played even remotely under control, within the flow of the offense, it’s hard to imagine how the Celtics would have run away in such a jaw-dropping fashion.
Instead, he was maladroit, dribbling — as Steve Kerr maligned earlier this season when referencing Poole’s aggravating habits in prior seasons — “a hole into the ground.”
He has this maddening habit of driving into the post, stopping his dribble and pivoting around with the unabated freneticism of a pinball game. That pattern has frequently led to turnovers this postseason. It did again on Thursday, and they wasted valuable chances for the Warriors to extend their lead.
There have been times watching Poole this season when he appears like the second coming of Curry; a bona-fide star scorer who can attack the rim with a deep bag of dribble moves, facilitate with aesthetic glory when a shot is unavailable, and rain hell from every inch of the basketball court.
But what makes the greatest so great is the consistency. Poole, as clear as day, does not have that consistency yet. Not even close, not even after that 17-game regular season stretch of scoring 20-plus points.
This is not the regular season.
Initiating the offense like someone playing NBA 2K and flicking the joystick around until a dribble move works out is not a viable strategy in the Finals, certainly not against the league’s best defense.
These are the perils of relying upon a 22-year-old who has an immense amount of growth left.
The Warriors are a simultaneously complex and simple offense. There are moving parts, well-timed screens and back cuts necessary for it all to work.
This has never been an iso-focused offense, and when Poole goes into that mode of dribbling a hole into the ground, he removes the Warriors from their flow. The Celtics are too smart and too defensively talented to be caught out consistently by a deft hesitation move.
Poole could be productive offensively without scoring — his ability to drive and facilitate deftly is in the upper echelon — but his tendency to overcomplicate his drives is what makes him so frustrating to watch.
He’d almost be better in a Klay Thompson role, spotting up on the wing and using his opportunities to drive at defenders after faking a shot, but he’s generally required to be the primary ball handler with those second units.
That responsibility won’t change, so he’ll have to adapt.
He absolutely has to be a positive on offense, because he’s such an obvious defensive liability that the Warriors are forced to play a zone defense almost exclusively when he’s on the court.
Boston showed its capacity for rapid ball movement, and when the open man isn’t missing, well, you better not miss either.
As Draymond Green said after the loss, “There is no margin for error.”
With Poole, and his net negative impact on defense, that margin of error is as slim as it gets. If Golden State is going to recover, Poole needs to start that effort by keeping things a whole lot simpler when he’s initiating the offense. If he gets in a rhythm — much like Thompson does, with good looks — this is an extraordinarily difficult team to contain.