Not delightful to watch, but it’s a win

SACRAMENTO — This game might not have been disgusting or pathetic. But it certainly wasn’t delightful. The only real drama in the Warriors’ regular season is seeing how they respond to their occasional mini slump. And so after their worst performance of the season — a complete dud in Utah, which head coach Steve Kerr labeled “disgusting” — the team had a chance to make amends against the Kings.

Before the game, Kerr said he hoped the team would “play delightful basketball.”

“It was not delightful,” he said afterward. “But we won.”

The Warriors pulled out a 119-104 win, but it was almost despite themselves. They were sloppy, they gave the ball away at an almost record clip and they played down to their competition. But they have more talent than the Kings. So they won.

The Warriors started out the game at Golden 1 Center looking as out of sorts as though they had just spent a few hours in the Tahoe-bound ski traffic on

Highway 80. They were flat, falling behind 20-7 and forcing a frustrated Kerr to use two timeouts in the first 6:04.

“When’s the All-Star break?” Kerr asked jokingly. “I was hoping you were going to say tomorrow.”

The Warriors certainly look like a team ready for the AllStar break.

“Hell yeah,” Kerr said. “Our guys are limping to the AllStar break. It’s painfully obvious that our guys are mentally fried right now.”

But there are a couple of problems with the “they-needa-break” scenario. The first is that they have six more games before the break — including the back end of a back-to-back Saturday night in Denver, then a tough homestand that includes Oklahoma City and San Antonio, and then a trip to Portland.

The second problem is that their four best players will all be working during the AllStar break, so it’s not exactly a restful vacation or a break from each other.

Still, the February break is a mental marker.

“We don’t talk about it at all,” Warriors guard Stephen Curry said. “You’ve got to fight human nature a little bit. We know how important that post All-Star run is and coming back strong and refreshed.”

Sometimes it seems that the games are the least important part of the Warriors’ dramatic narrative. This week we’ve had the ridiculous LeBron James story, custom-made to dominate hour upon absurd hour of ESPN programming.

We’ve had social media gaffes. Kerr had a Direct Message that went live on Twitter calling James Harden’s blatant traveling an embarrassment. Kerr blamed it on his inability to handle his new iPhone 10 — a problem his wife, Margot, calls “Dads on Twitter.” The tweet was live for about 30 seconds before player-development coach Chris DeMarco deleted it, but there were already plenty of screenshots of it (Kerr could ask some of his players about how those screenshots never disappear).

And there was social media news. On Friday, Ayesha Curry announced that the Curry family will be growing, posting a picture of herself in a T-shirt that said “PREGGERS” on Instagram, with a caption “Curry party of 5...#curryfor3.”

All that seems way more exciting than game 52 against the Sacramento Kings.

This was a matchup between arguably the worst team in the league and the best. The Kings, with the second-worst record in the league, are vying for a lottery pick and another young piece for their babyfaced roster.

But they played like a team that believed it could beat the Warriors. That’s probably because they already have. Back in November, the Kings came into Oracle and won. But that was a game that both Kevin Durant and Curry missed due to injuries.

But on Friday night, the Warriors’ two best players were on the court. They were lethal as usual: Durant had 33 points, and Curry added 23. But between them they had 11 turnovers (Curry with six and Durant with five). Draymond Green added five as well.

Despite Kerr’s constant harping about turnovers, the Warriors continue to be ridiculously sloppy with the ball. Their 25 total turnovers were just one shy of their seasonhigh 26 against Detroit in a home loss in October.

But the brick-laying Kings couldn’t do a lot with all those gifts, shooting just 44.2 percent. A more competent team would have made the Warriors pay with more than just 19 points off 25 turnovers.

Now it’s another high-altitude game in Denver and then another five games that will require focus.

Then comes the break, which for many of the Warriors, will be a working vacation with more drama in the narrative.

Delightful.