Player grades: Warriors vs. Thunder

Once again, the Golden State Warriors defense simply no-showed for a road game. The Dubs couldn’t get a stop to save their soul, and dropped their seventh consecutive road game, losing 138-127 to the Oklahoma City Thunder. The momentum from the five-game winning streak — conveniently all at home, but sans Steph Curry and Andrew Wiggins — has evaporated.

Time to break out a whole bunch of red pen and grade the players. As always, grades are weighted based on expectations, with a “B” grade representing the average performance for a player.

Note: True-shooting percentage (TS) is a scoring efficiency metric that accounts for threes and free throws. League-average TS is 58.0%.

Draymond Green

33 minutes, 11 points, 1 rebound, 11 assists, 1 steal, 2 turnovers, 2 fouls, 5-for-7 shooting, 1-for-1 threes, 78.6% TS, +4

Draymond is closer to the Warriors solution than he is to their problem right now. But he’s still the first person anyone is going to look at when the team is struggling to play good defense, fair or not.

His offense was stellar in this one, as a playmaker, screen-setter, and even scorer.

But his D wasn’t as good as it’s capable of being, and the Warriors need a lot more rebounding from their frontcourt than they got in this one.

Grade: B-

Post-game bonus: Led the team in assists and plus/minus.

Jonathan Kuminga

28 minutes, 21 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals, 2 turnovers, 2 fouls, 8-for-11 shooting, 1-for-3 threes, 4-for-4 free throws, 82.3% TS, +3

This game was a shining example of what the Warriors want Kuminga to do on offense. His athleticism was on full display, with numerous dunks, layups, and free throws earned from cutting to the rim with good timing and authority. He took jumpers only when they were wide open or the shot clock was running down, and worked inside-out. Magnificent.

That said, it wasn’t a good defensive game for him. He had his moments, but was a little over-eager on some plays, and slow to rotate on others. The Warriors were outrebounded 44-33, and Kuminga and Green combining for just four boards was a huge part of why.

Grade: B

Steph Curry

35 minutes, 40 points, 6 rebounds, 7 assists, 6 turnovers, 4 fouls, 14-for-23 shooting, 10-for-16 threes, 2-for-2 free throws, 83.6% TS, -2

Despite some maddening moments, the Warriors actually had a really, really good offensive game. And Curry was the primary reason why.

The Chef was deep in his bag in this one, pulling out all the stops to drain triple after triple after triple. He hit them when the Warriors were falling behind and desperately needed a shot. He hit them when they were making a run and stealing the momentum.

He was magnificent. The brutal turnover numbers were the one stain on an otherwise excellent day at the office, but honestly a lot of them were just miscommunications with teammates rather than bad plays.

Grade: A

Post-game bonus: Led the team in points.

Klay Thompson

40 minutes, 23 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, 2 turnovers, 1 foul, 9-for-17 shooting, 5-for-13 threes, 67.7% TS, -10

All I can really say is that when the Splash Brothers combine to score 63 points on 15-for-29 shooting from deep, and the Warriors lose, something else has gone very wrang.

A-

Donte DiVincenzo

33 minutes, 7 points, 6 rebounds, 7 assists, 3 steals, 2 turnovers, 5 fouls, 2-for-8 shooting, 1-for-6 threes, 2-for-2 free throws, 39.4% TS, -10

DiVincenzo is mired in a stretch where he’s doing everything well except shooting. Over his last four games he’s shooting 7-for-29 from the field and 5-for-21 on threes.

He’s doing a lot of other things well though, and hopefully he and Curry use the flight to Memphis to point out that they had three times as many rebounds as Green and Kuminga in this game.

Not DiVincenzo’s best defensive performance at all.

Grade: C+

Post-game bonus: Tied for the team lead in assists.

Andre Iguodala

12 minutes, 2 points, 2 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 turnovers, 1-for-1 shooting, 100.0% TS, -14

Iguodala’s stint in the first quarter was huge, and played a big role in the Dubs overcoming their first of three double-digit deficits. He struggled a bit more when he played in the second half, though.

Grade: C

Post-game bonus: Worst plus/minus on the team.

JaMychal Green

13 minutes, 9 points, 3 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 assist, 1 block, 1 turnover, 2 fouls, 2-for-3 shooting, 1-for-2 threes, 4-for-4 free throws, 94.5% TS, -3

Steve Kerr is figuring out when to deploy JMG. In half of Green’s games, he plays only a few minutes and looks pretty bad. In the other half, he plays a good chunk of minutes and looks awesome. Kerr is figuring out which matchups work best.

Green was awesome in this game. He provided energy when the team desperately needed it, but more importantly he made a handful of shots, grabbed some boards, and played decent enough defense.

Grade: A-

Kevon Looney

11 minutes, 4 points, 5 rebounds, 1 steal, 3 turnovers, 3 fouls, 2-for-4 shooting, 0-for-2 free throws, 41.0% TS, -8

Looney was a late addition to the injury report, and a game-time decision. Was that the reason he came off the bench, played limited minutes, and didn’t play very well? Quite possibly.

We don’t know how compromised he was, so his bad grade is based on grading him relative to my normal expectations, but I’m guessing Looney had a good reason for playing poorly.

Grade: C-

Patrick Baldwin Jr.

4 minutes, 0 points, 0-for-3 shooting, 0-for-3 threes, 0.0% TS, -2

Baldwin’s shooting has cooled off lately. After starting the season 28-for-59 from deep, he’s just 1-for-11 in his last four games. Still, I have no problems with any of the shots he took.

Grade: C

Jordan Poole

32 minutes, 11 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 block, 2 fouls, 4-for-12 shooting, 1-for-7 threes, 2-for-2 free throws, 42.7% TS, -3

Not sure what to say about Poole that I haven’t said in his other recent games. He is, as the kids say, going through it. And it’s getting difficult to watch.

I thought he started this game well, attacking the rim more instead of settling for the low-percentage jumpers that have taken over his game lately. Then he reverted to those habits. He’s 4-for-22 from three-point range in his last three games, and 20-for-77 in his last nine, as his percentage is reaching Westbrookian levels. Unlike Baldwin and DiVincenzo, it’s not a cold jumper on good shots. It’s just bad shots.

Credit to him for not turning the ball over. And credit to him for not losing his mind when he was called for one of the weakest technical fouls you will see in your entire life.

But hard to give much credit beyond that.

Grade: D+

Tuesday’s inactives: Ty Jerome, Anthony Lamb, Moses Moody, Lester Quiñones, Ryan Rollins, Andrew Wiggins