Walton might get credit for Warriors wins after all.
PHOENIX — Maybe Luke Walton is going to get credit for those 17 Warriors wins after all.
The NBA is looking into the long-held custom of wins and losses not being credited to interim coaches but rather to head coaches on leave such as the Warriors’ Steve Kerr, a source said Friday.
The reconsideration likely has to do with the awkward situation the league is about to face: Who gets Western Conference coach of the month honors, and what will his official record be?
“It doesn’t matter to me,” Walton said. “It really doesn’t.
… I’m good either way.”
Walton has served as the interim head coach throughout the Warriors’ recordbreaking 17-0 start. But Walton’s record officially stands at 0-0 because current NBA policy awards those victories to Kerr, the head coach by title. Kerr hasn’t coached a game this season while recovering from two offseason back surgeries.
Warriors forward Draymond Green weighed in for Walton before Friday’s game against the Phoenix Suns.
“He’s done a phenomenal job, so he should have 16 wins right now. But it’s cool.”
Walton said Kerr has joked about the coaching record situation.
“For a while there I’d get the text after every game or if he was still in the building just a ‘Thanks for another one’ type of text,” Walton said. “Or before we’d walk out, he’d tell the whole staff, ‘Go get me a win, boys’ on our way out to the court.”
In a recent interview, Kerr said it’s “ridiculous” that he is getting credit for the victories. “I’m sitting in the locker room and watching the games on TV, and I’m not even traveling to most of the road games. Luke’s doing all the work with the rest of the staff. Luke is 150 right now. I’m not. So it’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, to be honest with you. I don’t even understand it,” Kerr told Ethan Sherwood Strauss of ESPN.com.