Getty Darvin Ham and LeBron James of the Los Angeles Lakers.
Oh dear, the Golden State Warriors may have broken Los Angeles Lakers head coach Darvin Ham. Wednesday’s Game 5 loss at Chase Center had the Lakers coach contradicting himself, when discussing the officiating in this series so far.
Prior to the game, Ham fired a shot at Warriors head coach Steve Kerr. He called out Kerr for “blaming officials,” in responses to the Golden State skippers’ rant about flopping.
“I just control what I can control, which is coaching my team,” Ham said with the utmost confidence before tip. “I don’t go down the rabbit hole of blaming officials.”
Darvin Ham on Steve Kerr’s comments on the Lakers flopping: “I just control what I can control, which is coaching my team. I don’t go down the rabbit hole of blaming officials.”
The two teams took the floor, the Warriors came out and got the 121-106 victory, and then Ham changed his tune a bit. In an act of hypocrisy, L.A.’s head coach did, in fact, complain about the officiating, following the loss.
“We played the same way we always play. I don’t know what’s a foul anymore,” Ham complained in response to the Lakers’ 15 free throw attempts in Game 5.
He was then asked if he felt Kerr’s comments impacted the judgement of the officials on Wednesday. Ham replied by stressing that his team hasn’t been flopping.
“We play a physical game of basketball. We don’t teach flopping. We don’t teach head snaps,” Ham stressed. “You see Bron [LeBron James], he’s got 1000 scratches on his arm. Same AD [Anthony Davis], same with Austin Reaves, same with Lonnie Walker. It’s unfortunate that it comes to that, but we haven’t done it all year, we’re not going to start now, looking for a third-party to help us. We’re just going to coach our team. We’re just going to play the way that we play, a physical, forceful brand of basketball, and let the chips fall where they may.”
LeBron James Refutes Steve Kerr’s Flopping Accusations After Loss to Warriors
Much like Ham, James wasn’t thrilled with Kerr’s accusations. He was sure to refute the notion that he and his Lakers teammates have been flopping, in order to draw more fouls.
“I just know that we, our coaching staff and us players, we don’t work on flopping,” James said via the NBA Interviews YouTube channel. “That’s not even at part of our game. Our game is to attack the paint. We don’t mind the contact. We actually like the contact and we don’t shy away from. We’re not a team that goes out there looking for flopping opportunities. That’s just not us, it’s never been. It’s actually never been any team that I’ve played on in my 20 years, where we’ve been a flopping team. It is what it is they have the right to say what they want to say. But, the game is always won in between the 4 lines; we need to be better.”
Steve Kerr Slams Lakers for Flopping vs. Warriors
This all stems from Kerr’s comments after Game 4. He told reporters that L.A.’s “gamesmanship” was “disappointing,” and called them out for flopping.
“I think we had three or four illegal screens called, and that was disappointing,” Kerr said via the Golden State Warriors official YouTube channel. “I didn’t get a look at the replay on any of them. But there were a couple that were very disappointing just live. The Lakers — they’re a team that plays with a lot of gamesmanship. They understand how to generate some calls. I thought they took some flops and were rewarded, but I’ll have to see the replays. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe those were all illegal screens but didn’t feel like it watching it.”
At the time of Kerr’s rant, L.A. had averaged 13 more attempts per game than the Dubs, through the first four meetings in the series.