DeMarcus Cousins’ road to mending reputation.
Talented center’s chance to show maturity is off to rocky start with Warriors
During his first four weeks with Golden State, DeMarcus Cousins seemingly did all he could to hush his critics. Teammates lauded Cousins for staying diligent in his rehab, mentoring the Warriors’ young centers and rooting loudly from the bench.
Then on Oct. 26, in the first quarter of a win over the Knicks at Madison Square Garden, Cousins backslid into bad habits. Referee Scott Foster told him to stop arguing with New York center Enes Kanter, but Cousins persisted, got assessed a technical and was ejected. It was the third time in the past 15 seasons that a player has gotten tossed from a game in which he didn’t play.
That Cousins’ first box score statistic as a Warrior was an ejection only amplified those insistent that he can’t change. Their argument is simple: Cousins has gotten into runins his entire career, so why would things be any different just because he is now on the back-to-back NBA champions?
However, Golden State is more focused on how Cousins responded to his ejection than the ejection itself. The day after getting tossed, during practice at the National Basketball Players Association gym in Manhattan, he pulled head coach Steve Kerr aside to apologize.
“I think he understands that he has a different role, a different team, a different situation,” Kerr said. “So he’s got to move forward in his career, and he knows that. That kind of stuff is not going to help us win a championship. It’s not going to help his reputation.
“I think he understands that, and I think he immediately regretted what happened. I really appreciate him coming to me and making that pretty clear.”
The question is whether that apology was the act of a more mature Cousins or an attempt to save face.
That might not be clear until Cousins, who started participating in team practices last week and hasn’t spoken publicly since late September, returns to the court. As Cousins played a game of 4-on-4 Thursday afternoon on a nearby court, Kerr conceded that Cousins still has “a ways to go” conditioning-wise and isn’t necessarily close to coming back.
In the meantime, he is acclimating to a locker-room environment wholly different from the ones he inhabited in Sacramento and New Orleans.
Unlike most teams, on which players are often labeled unprofessional for cracking jokes after a loss, the Warriors appreciate Cousins’ laughter and humor. For perhaps the first time in his career, he can be his fun-loving self without fear of reprimand.
Many in Golden State’s organization reckon that Cousins isn’t much different than Warriors forward Draymond Green, whose bravado is embraced because it’s a driving force in the team’s success. The Warriors are willing to tolerate the occasional technical foul from Cousins as long as he doesn’t undermine their ethos.
“The more you’re around somebody, the more you get to know him, the more that bond grows,” Green said. “I think our bond has definitely grown since he’s been here, and it’ll continue to grow.”
The Warriors hope Cousins will show he is far more mature than his reputation suggests, but their season doesn’t depend on it. Even if Golden State’s one-year arrangement with Cousins goes bust, it could still achieve all its goals, riding four other All-Stars to a third straight NBA title and a fourth in five seasons.
The stakes are much higher for Cousins. To be a factor in the Warriors’ latest championship pursuit and land a big contract somewhere next summer, he’ll need to quiet questions about more than the recovery of his torn left Achilles tendon. This might be Cousins’ lone chance to show the world that he can be a productive, respected member of a winning team.
“He really needs something like this to really understand how to carry yourself,” former Warriors forward Matt Barnes said before Golden State’s season-opening win over Oklahoma City. Barnes has remained close with Cousins since they played together in Sacramento in 2016-17. “As a man and as a person, it’s going to be a tremendous opportunity for him to grow.”
By age 12, Cousins stood 6-foot-5. Those who didn’t see his boyish face or hear his high-pitched voice could have easily confused him for an adult.
Even today, after eight NBA seasons and four All-Star appearances, Cousins, 28, is a bit of an enigma. At 6-11, 270 pounds, he is one of the most imposing players in the league. But there have been moments, when Cousins has thrown a tantrum or acted like a petulant bully, that leave some to wonder whether he’s still just a big kid.
In July, when Cousins decided to sign a one-year, $5.3 million contract with Golden State after every other team reportedly passed on him, he received this text from Barnes: “This is going to be an amazing experience for you.”
Not only does Cousins have the chance to play in his first playoff game, win his first championship and hit free agency next summer a wanted man. With the Warriors, he can learn to become the leader another team will need him to be.
“This is going to be the best possible situation for him because day in, day out he’s going to learn how to carry himself as a professional, as a winner, as a man,” Barnes said. “I think these guys are going to hold him accountable, and he hasn’t been on teams that have necessarily done that.”