Oubre: Forward fills in for star, hopes it’s home

Kelly Oubre Sr. calls his son, Kelly Oubre Jr., a journeyman.

In NBA parlance, that title is typically reserved for older players who pingpong between teams in hopes of extending their careers. But two weeks shy of his 25th birthday, Oubre Jr. reckons that he deserves the “journeyman” label because, outside of 31⁄ seasons with the

2 Wizards, he has been on the move the vast majority of his life.

Now on his third NBA team in less than a week, Oubre hopes to find a true home with the Warriors. This is an organization whose luxurytax bill

spiked by nearly $ 70 million when it acquired him to help replace the injured Klay Thompson this season. Just as Golden State is committed to maximizing Oubre’s physical tools, Oubre is intent on making good on his new franchise’s investment.

During his five NBA seasons, he has been in only 18 playoff games. Stops in Washington and Phoenix were clouded by coaching changes, dysfunctional ownership and a nagging sense that Oubre was even better than his production indicated. In the Warriors, he sees a stable franchise with a winning pedigree that can allow him to put an end to his nomadic ways.

Referencing Golden State majority owner Joe Lacob, Oubre said in a radio interview Monday, “I can play for an owner, somebody who actually cares about the organization — not just the perception of the organization on the media end of it.”

Before Oubre hits free agency next summer, he wants to impress enough this season that the Warriors are willing to bring him back on a longterm deal. It’s no secret that they acquired Oubre from Oklahoma City for a 2021 conditional firstround pick and a 2021 secondround pick largely as a oneyear fillin as Thompson recovers from a torn right Achilles tendon.

But if Golden State was concerned only with its immediate void along the wing, it might have used its $ 17.2 million trade exception to absorb the salary of someone with more playoff experience, such as Eric Bledsoe or Eric Gordon. The Warriors are shouldering such a significant financial burden for Oubre because they believe he can blossom into a franchise building block.

Assuming Thompson returns for the 202122 season, Oubre could provide value as a versatile, highenergy sixth man for a team trying to vault back into contention. Perhaps Oubre could develop into the Warriors’ small forward of the future if they decide to deal Andrew Wiggins and his massive contract for an AllStarcaliber player.

“I’m looking forward to just finding a place I can literally just call home for a very long time,” Oubre said. “We’ve just been moving around throughout our whole lives. We’ve found comfortability in the uncomfortable, but I’m trying to be comfortable before I have a family and just continue to grow in this life.”

As a young kid growing up in New Orleans, Oubre moved with his family often, one housing project or apartment to the next. Around 3 a. m. one day when Oubre was 9, his dad piled up as many of their belongings as he could fit into his Toyota Sequoia and drove in search of higher ground.

Hurricane Katrina was approaching. After the levees broke and the city was ravaged, the Oubres shared a bed at a roachinfested motel in Houston. Oubre Sr. ended up working three jobs — one selling Yellow Pages ads, one selling placards on shopping carts and another selling insurance — to provide for his family in the Houston suburb of Richmond.

But by the time Oubre Jr. had emerged as one of the nation’s top recruits at Bush High School in Fort Bend, Texas, Oubre Sr. knew they needed to find better competition. The two moved to Henderson, Nev., where Oubre Jr. spent his senior season at basketball powerhouse Findlay Prep.

One year at Kansas later, he was drafted No. 15 overall by the Hawks and quickly traded to the Wizards. Though Oubre showed flashes of his potential in Washington, he sometimes struggled to rein in his emotions, talking back to coaches or getting into oncourt skirmishes with opponents.

Desperate to free up salarycap space, the Wizards traded Oubre with Austin Rivers to Phoenix in December 2018 for Trevor Ariza. In two seasons with the Suns, Oubre became a vocal leader of the team’s “Valley Boyz” movement, exciting fans with his brash style and acrobatic dunks.

But just as he thought he might have found somewhere to settle down, he underwent meniscus surgery. Reports suggest that Oubre and management disagreed about whether he was ready to play in the recent Orlando bubble. As Suns fans began to question Oubre’s devotion to the franchise, he watched his teammates go 80 and become a national story line.

Last week, after finishing a workout at Phoenix’s practice facility, he noticed players and executives staring at him as he walked off the court. Sensing that he must’ve been traded, Oubre asked center Frank Kaminsky where he was headed, to which Kaminsky replied,

“OKC.”

After Oubre went several days without hearing from the Thunder’s front office, Oklahoma City general manager Sam Presti informed Oubre on Thursday that he would be on the move yet again — this time, to the Warriors. This came as somewhat of a relief to Oubre, who, over the past halfdecade, has come to respect what Golden State represents: teamwork, ball movement, joy.

When Oubre met Warriors head coach Steve Kerr in person on Monday, he apologized for being quiet, saying, “I’ll loosen up a little bit. I’m just kind of in shock a little bit that I can play for you and this organization.”

After a journey that has come to feel like one long, itinerant trip, Oubre is just pleased to be in a place where he could see himself finally carving out his niche. The journeyman label might be apt at the moment. But in a few years, he hopes to replace it with another title: franchise cornerstone.

“I’m optimistic,” Oubre said. “I definitely see myself being able to fit in and make this place a home.”