Oubre Jr.’s career night fuels Barkley’s trade argument
It didn’t take Charles Barkley long to go there again.
Twenty seconds into TNT’s Inside The NBA crew of host Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal, Kenny Smith and Barkley recapping Golden State’s win Thursday night at Dallas, the Suns legend once again questioned why Phoenix traded Kelly Oubre Jr.
Watching Oubre Jr. go for a careerhigh 40 points just further fuels Barkley’s argument the Suns shouldn’t have dealt him as part of the Chris Paul deal before the season.
“Listen, I love Phoenix, but man, I don’t have any idea why they let Kelly Oubre go,” Barkley said Thursday night.
Barkley also said this during TNT’s telecast of Phoenix’s 114-93 win Jan. 28 over Golden State in Oubre’s first game in Phoenix since the trade that sent him, Ricky Rubio, Jalen Lecque, Ty Jerome and a future first-round pick to Oklahoma City for Paul and Abdel Nader.
Oubre finished with just four points on 1-of-11 shooting as he went 0-for-5 from 3.
So that took considerable steam out of Barkley’s comments.
Oubre isn’t having a great year in his first season with the Warriors (12-10) after having a career one last season in Phoenix.
The Suns have a winning record as Paul has played some of his best basketball with them recently.
Then New Orleans drums Phoenix (12-9) by 22 points on Wednesday as Paul scored only 10 points after going for a season-high 34 in a win Monday at Dallas.
Twenty-four hours later, Oubre goes off against the Mavericks.
“It was just an awesome flow,” Oubre said Friday as the Warriors face the Mavs again Saturday in Dallas. “I was able to find a flow, find a rhythm early on in the game and definitely the pace played a big factor in it because it was not much room for error or not much time to think. That definitely played a big factor.”
Oubre went 7-of-10 from deep, which goes completely against his season numbers from 3, now at 27.2% even after his career night.
“Offensively, he had a slow start to the year, and it’s been kind of up and down, but he knows he can impact the game a lot of different ways and his offense will click and win us some games like it did tonight,” said Warriors guard Stephen Curry in a postgame interview on TNT.
Curry continued by crediting Oubre for handling the scrutiny he receives on his game.
“He always shows up with energy, he never gets in his feelings and in this league, you’ve got to be a grown man about it and that’s what he’s doing,” Curry added.
Oubre said Friday he’s off social media right now, something that he did last season when shutting down his Twitter account.
“I’m just focusing on what is in front of me each and every day,” Oubre said. “This team, my family. That’s all I really care about, man. Just focusing on that. It really helps me get through these days.”
When looking at this trade, Phoenix wasn’t going to get a player like Paul, an all-time great at his position, without giving up a quality player.
No offense to Ricky Rubio, but he wasn’t going to be enough.
In order to pull this off, a talent like Oubre had to be included in the trade.
The Suns miss his athleticism, ability to attack the rim and energy. Oubre has unlimited potential, but Paul gives them veteran leadership, playmaking, playoff experience and attention to detail at the highest level.
He’s comes from a place where his demands are respected and followed without question.
Plus Oubre was in the final year of his deal before becoming an unrestricted free agent. So the Suns were going to risk losing him for nothing at season’s end.
They instead traded him for a player who has been there and done that time and time again at an all-star level.
The Warriors desperately needed someone to offset losing Klay Thompson for a second straight year to a season-ending injury. Oubre can’t consistently light it up from deep like Thompson, one of the game’s best 3-point shooters ever, but he is a better athlete.
Oubre’s challenge is consistently finding his comfort level in Golden State’s offense. There’s a big difference between being in the offense and flowing in it.
That’s been hit or miss with Oubre. “For Kelly, it’s been a rough first quarter of the season,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr after the game. “And yet within that span, he’s had some excellent games for us. He’s played very well at times. He’s just had some real poor shooting nights during that span that people have locked in on.”
On Thursday night, it was a big hit that led to a win for Golden State and further fueled Barkley’s argument that Phoenix shouldn’t have let Oubre go.
March 4 can’t get here soon enough, when Golden State returns to Phoenix to play the Suns going into the all-star break.
“Kelly is getting more comfortable,” Kerr continued. “The guys in the locker room love him and want to help him continue to get comfortable and this was obviously a great night for him and for the whole group.”