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Makik Brown: Buddy on what he envisions his role being next season: “Of course I want to play but if I’m called to a different role I’ll accept that. If I’m called to be one of those leaders and when my number is called, I’ll do that… “I’m not going to be one of those stubborn guys and say ‘I want to play’…”
Kevin Chouinard: Buddy Hield, on Zaccharie Risacher: “You just use this test, turn this into testimony. And when you look back on it in three or four years, you’ll be like, ‘Man, I've been in the fire for a reason.’ “And I think he's going to get all of that, and I tell him that he's going to have a summer where – whether he's in LA or Miami, where he's not going back to Europe – he's staying here and he's going to play a lot of basketball and he's going to work on his game and he's going to get a lot better.”
Well, it was his Warriors teammate, the one and only Steph Curry, who got Butler this time. Back when the sharpshooter entered his own sneaker free agency and had the entire league wondering what kicks he’d be rocking on any given night, Curry stunned Butler when wearing a pair from his signature line with Li-Ning during a game. “I think the first time I wore a shoe other than my own in an actual game, which was the [Li-Ning Jimmy Butler JB4 “Dark Knight”],” Curry said on his YouTube channel when asked about which pair of sneakers he wore that surprised people the most. “Those, even my own teammates, nobody knew I was actually going to wear another shoe outside of mine until literally right when we went to the starting lineups, and we were in the circle. “We do like this little dance, and everybody's getting hype, and then (ex-Golden State fan favorite Buddy Hield) pointed down and is like, ‘Oh, look at–,’ and then Jimmy looked down; he lost his mind because he didn't even know, because everybody's kind of in their own mode, getting ready for the game. I'll remember that moment for the rest of my life, just because it was kind of from a teammate-to-teammate perspective of being able to show love."
Buddy Hield was on that Pacers team. He believed he had a long-term NBA home and said Carlisle, who he considered "a mentor," visited his house several times and assured him the franchise would take care of him that summer, despite a plan in the final weeks to move Hield to the bench and significantly reduce his minutes for the betterment of the organization. "It was an extension year," Hield said. "Then when it comes to extension talks, it was like, 'Oh, the numbers, X, Y, Z.'" Hield believed his value had been manipulated and, three years later, wonders whether that brief late-season tanking strategy sent his late prime down an altered path. "It f---ed up the money," Hield said. "Me and Rick are still close, but that really rubbed me in the wrong way. Tanking just f---ed everything up for everybody."
The partnership reached its end with a trade demand, which led to the Warriors sending Jonathan Kuminga and Buddy Hield to the Atlanta Hawks just before last month’s trade deadline in exchange for Kristaps Porziņģis. When asked about what goes through his mind the most in advance of Saturday’s reunion game against Kuminga in Atlanta, Kerr answered through the lens of a coach trying to navigate his own team through a losing skid at the end of a long season. “To be honest,” Kerr told The Athletic with a chuckle, “I haven’t given it much thought because we’re trying to win a damn game. But I can tell you that everybody likes JK. Everybody on our team wants the best for him. I want the best for him.”
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“I think the trade was a good one,” Kerr said. “Both guys are very talented. I think everything in the NBA is circumstantial. I think players need the right set of circumstances to thrive. And the trade made sense because these were not the right circumstances for JK. And you can see right away that Kristaps has a very clear role on this team, something we’ve needed for years. And we’re looking forward to getting him out there with Steph. And so in the end, hopefully it’s a trade that works for both guys and both teams.”
“You either have to go all in and build around Trae or you’ve got to go all in with the young guys and start to build it together, and it looks like they’ve done that,” the scout said. “They’ve made sure that almost everyone they’ve brought in has been a shooting piece, except for Kuminga.” Kispert, Hield and McCollum each has a career 3-point shooting percentages of 38% or higher, and Landale has shot 40% from 3-point range over the past three seasons.
Q. What is the Mount Rushmore in your opinion of Oklahoma basketball? Jeremiah Fears: I'll definitely say me… I'm going to say recent players because I mean obviously it's history, but still recent. So, I'll probably say me, Trae Young, Blake Griffin, Buddy Hield, and probably Austin Reaves. He’s been doing his thing.
Edgecombe also became the 22nd Sixers player to be named to All-Star Weekend’s Rising Stars game, which will played Friday at Intuit Dome in Inglewood, California. The Rising Stars includes three teams of stellar first- and second-year players and one G League All-Star team playing in a four-team, single-elimination tournament. After Flagg and Charlotte Hornets rookie guard Kon Knueppel, Edgecombe was the third selection. “I remember when Buddy [Hield] won the 3-point contest [in 2016],” Edgecombe said. “That is something I will always remember. All-Star games. … It’s a blessing to be recognized to participate in such a special weekend throughout the NBA season. Obviously, everyone’s goal is the Sunday game. That is everyone’s goal. “I was fully blessed to be chosen to be in Rising Stars. I’m looking forward to it. Hopefully, I’m playing in the Sunday game, also.”
Curry wasn't the only former teammate to come to Kuminga's defense, though Buddy Hield offered a more tongue-in-cheek response. "They lying it was Jimmy," he wrote on Instagram, jokingly blaming Jimmy Butler.
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Pat Spencer’s competitive nature within the Warriors’ facility is well-known. Ask around, and there’s always a story about how frustrated he can get after losing a pick-up game, how intensely he treats each rep and how seriously he takes film sessions even when his role is uncertain. “He’s like one of the coaches over there,” former Warriors guard Buddy Hield said. “Because in [the] film session he’s always talking, so he knows what the coaches want and he has that eye. He has a great basketball mind. I think he’s going to have a bright future after basketball in this league, too. I love him a lot. … I understand him. I understand his struggles.”
The Warriors forward discussed on the latest episode of his podcast, "The Draymond Green Show," Golden State trading Kuminga, along with guard Buddy Hield, to the Atlanta Hawks for Kristaps Porzingis before Thursday's NBA trade deadline and shared his appreciation for how Kuminga handled himself throughout his four-plus seasons with Golden State, despite not receiving consistent playing time after he was selected with the No. 7 pick in the 2021 draft. "When you're the seventh pick in the NBA draft, you usually go to a place where they're going to give you the ball, they're going to allow you to make a ton of mistakes, and you grow through those mistakes in hopes that you become a key, cornerstone, franchise piece to the rebuild of the team that drafted you with the seventh pick," Green said of Kuminga. "You're usually not drafted to a team that's good enough to compete and win a championship that year. That's the hand Jonathan Kuminga was dealt. And so I appreciate the way he handled it, the maturity he showed in handling the situation the entire time, even when the writing was on the wall and everybody in the world kind of knew a trade was going to happen."
Kevin Chouinard: Buddy Hield is listed as 'available' on the 2:45 injury report. Jonathan Kuminga remains out (Injury/Illness-Left Knee; Bone Bruise).
Jake Fischer: The Golden State Warriors all but pivoted trading Jonathan Kuminga to the Atlanta Hawks with Buddy Hield in exchange for Kristaps Porzingis. That was a clear signal that the Golden State Warriors believed they were no longer in the mix for Giannis Antetokounmpo. In fact, in the very early stages of that, I was told from multiple people with knowledge of the situation that the Warriors never felt that Milwaukee was really invested in having a true fair dialogue with the Warriors to get a deal done. The Warriors compensation, four first-round picks was a pretty hefty offer. That plus Jonathan Kuminga should have been enough in the Warriors mind to at least start a conversation in earnest with Milwaukee. But there was never really a counter situation back and forth. The Warriors did not think that Milwaukee was really offering in good faith and having true back and forth dialogue that would have led to a trade happening whatsoever.
