Andre Iguodala defends Warriors training staff on how they managed himself & Kevin Durant

Bay Area News Group caught up with Warriors veteran Andre Iguodala, who clarified his remarks about the team's training staff.

OAKLAND — Did the Warriors’ training staff mishandle injuries to Kevin Durant and Andre Iguodala?

The general public had that impression with Durant after he ruptured his right Achilles tendon against the Toronto Raptors in Game 5 of the NBA Finals after sitting out the previous nine games with a strained right calf. When addressing that issue on ‘The Breakfast Club’ on Tuesday to promote his recently released memoir. Iguodala indicated the Warriors’ training staff said during the 2018 NBA playoffs that he had a “bone bruise” in left leg when he also had a fracture.

In a wide-ranging interview with Iguodala partly to talk about his new book, “The Sixth Man,” however, the Warriors’ veteran absolved the Warriors’ training staff on how they both handled himself and Durant.

“I always have great faith,” Iguodala told Bay Area News Group about the Warriors’ training staff. “I always talk about all of our trainers, past, present and hopefully in the future. We have a great group of guys.”

Iguodala first defended how the Warriors’ training staff handled Durant, who formally opted out of his $31.4 million player option on Wednesday to become an unrestricted free agent starting on Sunday. Should Durant feel the Warriors’ training staff misled him on the risks of returning from a strained right calf, Iguodala argued it is not fair.

“From what I learned about the body is that I don’t think the two were connected personally with his injuries,” Iguodala said. “When he goes down, I look at it as an act of God and a higher power that says, ‘This is your journey and the course. Of course, we as human beings, we try to have control over everything. We want to control the narrative. We want to put our opinions to everything and say we’re right about something and try to prove someone else wrong. Especially with our team and situation, someone is trying to knock us off a pedestal. Someone is trying to break us apart. I’ve said that many things throughout my career. This was actually something that was positive. But with this being with our team, it was turned into something negative. That was my take on KD’s thing. I don’t think he was pressured by anyone.”

Pub day was a huge success… Second printing on the way… thanks for supporting The Sixth Man pic.twitter.com/KP7WlTPiP9

— andre (@andre) June 26, 2019

Nor did Iguodala believe that the Warriors training staff pressured him or misled him about his own injury during the 2018 NBA playoffs. The Warriors determined that Iguodala suffered a left lateral leg contusion and bone bruise late in Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals against the Houston Rockets, an outcome that led many the Warriors to believe the series would not have gone to seven games if not for his injury that sidelined him for six games. The Warriors have an internal policy that requires approval from the player and his representatives to approve on the wording of their respective injury. Nonetheless, Iguodala had a second opinion in hopes for more clarity to address what he discovered to be a spider fracture in his left leg. Iguodala then returned for Games 3 and 4 of the 2018 NBA Finals against Cleveland before  Iguodala had a non-invasive procedure on his left leg in the offseason.

“I don’t think it was internal pressure at all,” Iguodala said of how the Warriors’ training staff handled his left leg injury. “It had nothing to do with me, When you read an MRI, it can be read so many different ways. Even if I thought what it was or they thought what it was, we were all clear and on the same page. My leg was stable. In that area, even if you have a bruise or a fracture, it is very similar. People don’t realize that. We were both on the same page that it was stable and that part of the body was fine to go play. Regardless of what I thought it was or what they thought it was or what anybody thought it was, we were all on the same page that I was good to go. It was a stable leg.”

Some necessary context. Chelsea Lane oversaw the Warriors’ training staff in 2017-18, including Iguodala’s left leg injury before, leaving to oversee the Atlanta Hawks’ training staff this season. The Warriors hired Dr. Rick Celebrini to oversee the Warriors’ training staff last season. Both the Warriors have lauded Lane and Celebrini for their collaborative and conservative approach. The Warriors’ training staff also includes head athletic trainer Drew Yoder and assistant athletic trainer Roger Sancho.

So what sparked Iguodala to say his original comments on “The Breakfast Club?”

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“My point I was trying to make was these are the pressures athletes face mentally,” Iguodala said. “When we go out there physically, we’re fine. We may have pain. With that stigma of ‘Are you injured or are you hurt?’, your reputation is made on things like that with big moments. They can say, ‘He was afraid of the moment and he acted like he was hurt when he really wasn’t.’ It’s not from the organization. It was just the pressures of fan, media and family. All of that goes into play. People try to act like all the money we receive takes that away. Then you’re taking away the human element, correct. My whole point is there is a human element. We feel all of these pressures.”

Iguodala handled that pressure just fine.

He returned in Game 3 of the 2018 NBA Finals against Cleveland and finished with eight points on 3-of-4 shooting and two rebounds in 22 minutes. Iguodala made crucial plays in that game, including a steal that led to a Stephen Curry 3-pointer that gave the Warriors a six-point cushion with 2:20 left. Less than a minute later, Iguodala drove for a dunk to give the Warriors a three-point lead. Iguodala followed that up in a decisive Game 4 with 11 points while going 4-of-8 from the field and 3-of-6 from 3 in 23 minutes.

“If you have an MRI, you can interpret it in many different ways and however many different interpretations,” Iguodala said. “I knew it was stable. I knew, for the most part, that it could only get better. It couldn’t get any worse. It showed. I went out there and played and had success and helped my team win. The team made the right decision. I made the right decision.”

Iguodala also believed the Warriors and Durant made the right decision for him to return in against Toronto in Game 5 of this year’s NBA Finals. The Warriors admit they did not anticipate Durant could worsen his injury, let alone injure his Achilles. They have determined, though, the MRI results did not show any correlation between Durant’s respective right calf and right Achilles injuries. Before the Warriors cleared Durant to play, they said that front office, training staff, coach Steve Kerr, Durant, his business manager, Rich Kleiman, and Durant’s outside medical doctors signed off on the decision. Iguodala found Durant to be “incredible” when he scored 11 points in 12 minutes before suffering an injury that contributed to the Warriors’ Game 6 loss to Toronto.

“Athletes sacrifice themselves to win a championship. Do you know how many guys would’ve killed themselves to win a championship?” Iguodala said. “That’s the point I’m making and what I’m saying in the book – the pressures of an athlete go much deeper than what people realize. They don’t see us as humans, sometimes. They’re missing that human element.”

Therefore, Iguodala sounded sensitive to the impact his original words made on the Warriors’ training staff.

“This is the template, this is the organization,” Iguodala said of the Warriors. “What we have to be wary of is a lot of stuff with us that is a headline that is trying to be negative is mainly just to mess up what we have going on.”

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