STEVE SAT DOWN at his computer and typed out a letter to Draymond Green. Green had been in a spiral. Draymond’s plus-minus stats in one stretch were -17, -10, -12, -10, -6, -5, -9. The team performed better when he wasn’t on the court, after a decade of being the Warriors’ emotional center. To prove to himself, and the team, that he mattered, he forced things on offense. He missed three straight games in December and on the night of his return in Portland, he committed eight turnovers. That’s when Kerr wrote the letter.

He told Dray how much he meant to him. He talked about the turnovers, how the Warriors were 9-2 when they turned the ball over less than their opponents, and 3-11 when they turned it over more. He talked about aging, about how all great players adapted at the end of their career. Magic Johnson learned how to shoot threes, he wrote, and Steph Curry got stronger, and Michael Jordan learned to dominate the low post. Your superpower, he told Green, is your brain and your defensive instincts. He told him he loved him. Most of all, he told him he understood him.

_

Green said nothing about the letter. He turned the ball over five times in the next game against Phoenix.

Genuinely great article, don’t get too many of these in sports journalism.

Three years ago, to entertain himself in his press conferences, Steve worked phrases from Swift’s song “All Too Well” into his interview answers, smoothly enough that nobody noticed. For instance, to get the first line of the song, he took the podium after beating the Rockets in March of 2023 and said, “I walked through the door of the locker room at halftime.” Over a long season he got most of the lyrics done, crossing them off as he went. His son Matthew later edited them into a video for their family group chat, so that Kerr appeared to have recited the whole song.

“She ended up seeing it through a mutual friend,” he said.

“Wait, is this real?” Taylor asked.

She thought it was creative and funny.

“Can I put it on social media?” she asked.

Kerr asked her team to please keep it private, even though he’d pulled the stunt in public night after night.

I cannot believe the MPJ we’re seeing is the one that has been in years of therapy, what was he like before lmao

The Taylor Swift thing and the fact nobody noticed is hilarious

He’d been in pain for 11 years now. On some level he’d given up on relief. Then this offseason, while on vacation in France, he listened to a podcast with psychotherapist and back pain expert Nicole Sachs. She talked about her work with NBA star Michael Porter Jr., who like Steve has had three back surgeries. That got Kerr’s attention and reminded him of a book he’d read by Alan Gordon, called “The Way Out.” Several years ago, he’d made significant progress on his pain with Gordon. Both Gordon and Sachs expanded on the work of Dr. John Sarno, who believed that chronic pain like Kerr’s came from unresolved, buried trauma, and the pain was the mind’s way of crying out for help. It’s called tension myositis syndrome, in which emotional stress causes physical responses. Kerr had discovered Sarno a decade ago and had corresponded with Gordon a few years back. Now, listening to Sachs’ podcast, the ideas had come back and had somehow hit him differently. His personality type of a sensitive perfectionist fit the mold of a TMS sufferer, and when he read Sachs’ book – it opened with a C.S. Lewis quote: “It is easier to say my tooth is aching than to say my heart is broken.” – he believed the treatment might work for him.

After an introduction from Porter, Sachs and Kerr started speaking directly. She gave him homework and on the eve of the season he started her program. The treatment involved setting a timer for 20 minutes every morning and then journaling, about trauma, about anger, shame and hatred. When the timer ran out, Kerr followed Sachs’ instructions and erased whatever he’d written and then would sit still and take a breath and begin a meditation, alone in the quiet of his emptying mind for no less than 10 minutes. Then he would stand, and breathe it out and go to coach his team.

the quotes you added as comments are much more interesting than the ones you put in the main post

One of the best sports articles I’ve ever read, a shame that even something like this will get broken down into engagement-seeking excerpts. Wright Thompson said this was his favorite profile he’s ever done, I think it shows in the writing.

[Inserting Swiftie references] Cant blame coaches for doing these type of things, their media obligations are crazy

A team’s GM and ownership can hide out forever, but head coaches get thrown to the wolves

Wright Thompson is the GOAT.

Really sad to not see a lot of engagement on this post. This is a fantastic article, beautifully written, melding past and future together. When I was reading, the different time periods blurred together, creating a hazy, dreamlike atmosphere, thanks to Thompson’s lovely writing. My favorite bits were the parts about his family and how his siblings coped with the grief of their father’s assassination. The Kerr family seems brilliant. Love this coach.

amazing article, it’s really an enlightening look at the season from hell through kerr’s eyes

it really sucks that this kind of thing gets less attention and acknowledgement than the old ass men on tv whining and yapping about how x player is trash and where y player ranks all time

Very interesting piece on Kerr. I especially found the ancedotes about his siblings, family and pain management interesting.

The part about Kuminga and Obama was unfortunately dissapointing. There’s basically nothing else aside from that one line.

What an amazing read. Just linking snippets does not do it justice. 

Dude loves his beer…and his Honey Baked.

Find someone who will love you the way Steve Kerr loves Draymond Green.

This was such a boring slog to read..

Kerr is soooooo boring & wishy washy..

Hated reading this..