Steve Kerr Comments on Marijuana Use, Charles Barkley, Coaching Future

The Golden State Warriors have been at the center of the NBA universe ever since they signed Kevin Durant and formed the league's pre-eminent superteam, and head coach Steve Kerr discussed criticisms of his squad and a few other compelling topics in a recent conversation with CSN Bay Area's Monte Poole on Friday. 

Kerr revealed he has smoked marijuana twice over the past year-and-a-half to try to alleviate the chronic pain he's been dealing with in his back.

While Kerr said smoking pot "doesn't agree" with him, he advocated for it as a safer pain-relief alternative than painkillers like Vicodin—especially when it comes to the injuries NFL players deal with. 

On Saturday, NBA spokesman Mike Bass released a statement on Kerr's comments, per Chris Haynes of ESPN.com: "All of our coaches are drug tested each season. Marijuana is included on our banned substances list. There are medical exceptions to our policy, but in this case, it's not relevant because Steve said he did not find marijuana to be helpful in relieving his back pain."

"Any vegetable that comes from the earth, they encourage you to eat it," Warriors star Draymond Green said when speaking about Kerr's comments, per Haynes.

In an interview with the Warriors Insider Podcast, Kerr touched on Charles Barkley's repeated criticisms of the Warriors a day after the Inside the NBA panelist said the Warriors play a "girly" style of basketball predicated on speed and shooting. 

Kerr's response focused on how teams across the league have adjusted their tactical preferences over time:

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I don’t really want to get into that too much. Having worked with Charles in TV, for TNT, I understand that there’s a show that has to happen. There’s an entertainment value that he brings that nobody else can bring. And I think Charles is hilarious. I think he’s really good at what he does. I think he goes overboard with his criticism of us. You know, everybody in the league is basically doing what we’re doing. I mean, Cleveland takes more threes than we do. And they beat us last year in the Finals by going small and shooting threes and LeBron playing the 4.

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Kerr later said, "I don’t know why Charles continues to crush us, but the game has changed, and almost everybody is playing like this now."

To Kerr's point, the Warriors don't rank first in three-pointers attempted or made. Specifically, the Houston Rockets entered Friday having attempted a league-high 703 triples, while the Brooklyn Nets rank No. 2 overall with 628 total attempts. The Warriors have 612 attempts, good for third.

Finally, Kerr touched on his coaching future and told Poole he looks forward to maintaining a post at the head of an NBA bench for years to come. 

"I really love what I do, and I imagine I'm going to do this for a long time," he said. "I don't know what else I would want to do. But they have to want you to do it too. So far, so good. We're doing fine. But this is a fickle business, and I'm enjoying coaching this great team that I've got right now."

Considering Kerr already has one Larry O'Brien Trophy and two Western Conference titles under his belt as a head coach, the 51-year-old should have no problem holding down his spot as the Warriors boss for the foreseeable future. 

And with a rapidly evolving team at his fingertips that packs loads of explosive potential, it wouldn't be a surprise to see the Warriors back in the NBA Finals for a third straight year when June rolls around.