I've recently been going back through the Golden State Warriors 2013-14 season looking at specific sources of the team's turnover problems (and why it subsided over the year), which means staring at a lot of frames of stagnant sets and poor decision making while one person dribbled around trying to make things happen with his teammates watching.
Suffice it to say, the video above of the offense that Steve Kerr implemented during summer league is a breath of fresh air.
Coach Nick of Bball Breakdown has already described what's going concisely on Twitter.
Looks like Kerr wants to merge the best of Bulls and Spurs into his offense. I like the ∆ actions I saw most, but watch out, NBA
— BBALLBREAKDOWN (@bballbreakdown) July 26, 2014
The #Knicks opted to teach 1st two options of ∆, beginning in order. Kerr went backwards, got 4th option going, PnR in corner
— BBALLBREAKDOWN (@bballbreakdown) July 26, 2014
Going thru Steve Kerr’s offense from Summer League. Right off the bat, I see corner option from ∆ as an automatic. #Happy
— BBALLBREAKDOWN (@bballbreakdown) July 26, 2014
And if you want a bit more depth on what he means by "first" and "fourth" options, I'd recommend his video explanation of how the New York Knicks are running the triangle under Derek Fisher/Phil Jackson.
You don't really want to read too much into this aside from the fact that it would behoove Kerr to get used to teaching the principles he'll be using during the year, but for those uncertain about Kerr's vision for the offense it's probably a good start.
As Coach Nick alluded to in both his tweets this morning and the previous video, this probably isn't a finished product: both Kerr and Fisher had to make some choices about what and how much to implement in the short time frame leading up to summer league. And it's also probably fair to assume that the offense is new to most of these players (in terms of what reads to make when). But there's a lot to be encouraged by for the upcoming season during which Kerr will have time and a full roster of NBA players.
Warriors were 12th in OffRtg last year. I predict Top 3 finish this year. Oh yeah, they’re ALREADY a top 5 defense.
— BBALLBREAKDOWN (@bballbreakdown) July 26, 2014
What's important is not whether they scored out of these sets but the positioning and series of decision-making. There's lots of purposeful movement, weak side counters, and decisive passing - the ball isn't sticking in one place for more than a dribble, if there are any dribbles at all, and there's a clear emphasis on "letting the ball do the work" of creating high-quality scoring opportunities.
Of course, it's not like every possession of summer league was as fluid as these clips - in fact, more often than not there seemed to be confusion when players were over-aggressive or tried to go one-on-one too much. And that's why triangle principles can be difficult to implement: they take time and a certain type of player to execute. The Warriors, as alluded to by Coach Nick, have the personnel to make this work and it's easy to see where specific players who struggled last season could really benefit from this more fluid offense.
For more on the Warriors new coaching staff - and an overview of principles Kerr might implement - check out our storystream about the Steve Kerr hire.