Harrison Barnes unplugged: On this Warriors reunion, Draymond Green, the Kings mission and more

June 24, 2024

SACRAMENTO — On April 11, four nights before the Kings’ 17-year-long playoff drought would finally come to an end with a first-round tipoff against the dynasty Warriors, they had a team dinner to discuss the daunting challenge ahead.

The location was familiar to the team’s players, coaches and staff, as they had all broken bread inside this same “Row One Club” at the Golden 1 Center six months before. That was back when their proverbial bar was lower, though, when the goal of reaching the postseason was front and center, and first-year coach Mike Brown made it clear that he wanted to build something sustainable in Sacramento from there.

The opponent was familiar too. Two days before, the Kings learned that they’d be opening the playoffs against the Warriors squad that so many of them knew so well.

It made perfect sense, then, that three of the Kings’ resident Warriors experts spoke at the event. There was Leandro Barbosa, the former Golden State player/assistant coach who came with Brown from the Warriors staff to Sacramento. There was Matthew Dellavedova, the former Cavs guard and current Kings player whose most memorable moment as a pro was battling the Warriors’ Steph Curry in the 2015 Finals. And there was Harrison Barnes, the veteran small forward who won a title with Golden State in 2015, was cast aside for Kevin Durant after the Warriors’ Finals collapse in 2016, followed by two-plus seasons in Dallas and in Sacramento since February 2019.

Barnes, perhaps more than anyone in that room, knew all too well that trips to the playoffs should not be taken for granted. And if these young and inexperienced Kings had any plans on taking the happy-to-be-here approach to the series, he was there to change the mood.

“It’s all a matter of being grateful,” he told The Athletic on Sunday while reflecting on his speech. “I think that a lot of guys assume that getting to the playoffs may be easy. Things come together. You’re gonna have all of these years to do all these different things. But I think every year is unique. The health that we’ve had — knock on wood. The season that we’ve had. Guys being able to play at a high level. That stuff doesn’t happen often, and in a playoff series, everyone’s start to a championship is even.

“So you have the opportunity to make your mark. You have the opportunity to do something special. And it’s not something where you just want to say, ‘Oh, OK, we made the playoffs this year, throw in the towel, and over the next couple years, you know, we’ll work our way up.’ I was like, ‘No, now is the opportunity where you go and you put your best foot forward with the mindset of having this be a playoff run as opposed to a playoff appearance.”

One week after that dinner, the Kings are well on their way to doing just that. Not only are they up 2-0 on the defending champions, but also they’ll face a Warriors team on Thursday at Chase Center that will be without Draymond Green for Game 3 after he was suspended for his foot stomp of Domantas Sabonis in Game 2.

For Barnes’ part, this personal matchup isn’t about grudges as much as it is chances. It had been seven years since he touched that playoff stage, with all those awful memories of his ’16 Finals struggles in the background and so much inconsequential basketball being played ever since. But like he told them all that night, this is different.

He has been a key factor in the series so far, playing tough defense on one end (three steals in each game) while being aggressive on the other (13 points per game). Ask anyone with the Kings, and they’ll tell you that his contributions go well beyond his stats. The impact of his voice, especially in this matchup where he’s uniquely qualified to help them understand the basketball enemy, has been as significant as anyone’s.

Still, it was his two crucial buckets late in Game 2 that helped the Kings maintain a late lead among the post-Green-ejection chaos. The first, which featured some high-level footwork as he spun around Klay Thompson, put the Kings up six at the 3:56 mark.

The second came with 1:42 left, when he took a pass from De’Aaron Fox and quickly attacked Curry for a runner that put the Kings up 109-103.

This conversation, which took place before Game 2, has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.

Paint the picture for me of that dinner you all had heading into this series.

It was the same vibe that we had for the preseason. We had talked about how we wanted to be a team that established our principles, played the right way every single night, gave ourselves a chance to win and hopefully we would be in a position where we could make the playoffs. Fast forward 82 games later, and now it’s a situation where we’ve done that. But as the season has gone on, we’ve adjusted our goals. We know what we want to do, and now is when we put everything together. All of the dress rehearsals, all of the talks about “This is what the playoffs look like,” — now it’s time to put that together.

Just the three of you spoke?

Yeah. LB (Barbosa) talked about his career, his playoff experience. Delly talked about his playoff experience. And for me, it was mostly just impressing upon the guys that you just never know when these opportunities will happen. I made the playoffs for four straight years at the beginning of my career, and I thought making the playoffs was going to be just a routine thing. I thought that most teams would get to the playoffs, and that was just a given. And then I didn’t see the playoffs for seven years. I just let them know that with these meaningful games and these opportunities, you want to take a moment to truly embrace it and just be grateful for that experience. But at the same time, you want to set your sight on a run. If you don’t have the confidence, and you don’t have the grit to dig out wins in a series, then it’s gonna be a quick series. I think we saw that in the last couple games before the regular season ended (when the Kings lost seven of their last 12 games). We left chips on the table.

Not to play sports psychologist with you, but it wouldn’t surprise me to hear you say that maybe you missed the playoff stage even more than you realized. Like you talked about, we all get older and you start to realize that the clock is always ticking. In terms of reflecting on the struggle that led to this after you left the Warriors, and what this means to you now, how do you unpack that?

I mean, it’s a lot. I think as a competitor, you always want to work on your craft. And I think for so long, you’re used to seeing work and results somewhat correlated. You put in some work, and the wins come. You’re in these moments. Then my first year in Dallas, I’m going from winning 70-plus games to almost losing 60-plus (the Mavs went 33-49 that season). It was such a jarring split.

The next season, it’s the same type of thing (the Mavs went 24-58). Then I come here (after getting traded to the Kings in February 2019), and my first year — in the first half season — we have a chance to make it (to the playoffs). But then you’re not getting there (the Kings went 39-43 under then-coach Dave Joerger; nine games out of the final playoff spot). You do a lot of soul searching. Like, my first three years (in Sacramento) were some of my more efficient (shooting) seasons, but it didn’t matter because you weren’t really winning anything. So it’s like, ‘Am I getting better? Am I impacting winning? Is this task too daunting?’ I mean, you have to look at it and say ‘What are the variables? Where are we at? Where are we going? Can we get this thing right?’’

Now this is probably the best team on paper that we’ve had, but we’ve had talented rosters year in and year out. You look at what (former Kings guard) Buddy (Hield) is doing (in Indiana) in terms of his three-point shooting, and (former Kings guard) Tyrese (Haliburton) being an All-Star (for the Pacers) this year, Alec Burks to (Nemanja) Bjelica going to Golden State (last season) to whoever you want to say. Everyone seemed to go and have success (elsewhere), and you’re like, “Why can’t it happen here?” I think it’s rewarding to see it through, because when you don’t see it through in a certain place you always wonder, like, “Was it me?”

In Dallas, when things weren’t going well and you leave and they have all this playoff success, you’re like, “Wow, that’s great.” But here, being on that same cusp, and obviously trade rumors and all that type of stuff, it could have ended much sooner. But to see this (come to fruition) is pretty cool.

So I hadn’t thought of this until now, but you are up this summer. Where’s your head at on that free agency front?

Yeah,I mean, this is my third time doing this. … I’m confident things always — they always work out how they’re supposed to. I think the biggest thing for me is making this playoff run just as memorable as possible. I’ve seen what it can do to a city, to an organization, to get to this point, to have some success, what it can do for a group of guys to have success. I think for me, it’s doing that. And then at the end of the day, (it’s) however it shakes out. If I come back, it’s like “Great,” and you build off it. If the organization wants to go in a different direction, then business is business. No hard feelings there.

Do you have any hard feelings from trade rumors of the past, or do you let those go?

Not at all. The trade rumors in the past, I think you fully accept those because of (the struggles) of the team. You look at it, and you say “OK, having three years of being here, three rounds of lottery picks, disappointment, where every trade deadline, you’re revamping the team.” You know what I mean? It makes sense. Two front offices (he came in under former Kings GM Vlade Divac). Joerger leaves. Alvin (Gentry was the head coach). Mike (Brown). There’s so much turnover that at that point, you’re just like, “I can’t expect to not be in those (trade) discussions.”

Dating to their days together with the Warriors, Barnes and Green have an interesting backstory. (Cary Edmondson / USA Today)

How do you truly feel about this Warriors matchup? All these years that you’ve been here, I could sense that you didn’t have any interest in revisiting that chapter. But you raised a trophy with that group in 2015, and your contributions get glossed over a bit. And there are still a whole lot of familiar faces that are still on the other side. I’m watching the game last night, and you’re getting after it, Draymond’s being Draymond, and the energy is off the charts. But I certainly felt like, within all of that, that there was something different between you and that group. How do you see it?

Yeah, I mean, look.

He pauses…

I mean, I have nothing but fond memories of my time with Golden State. Obviously, I think losing the Finals is always going to leave a black eye in terms of how things went, and obviously they’ve gone on to have success since. But I don’t have any ill feelings towards anybody in that organization, and I think for me, it’s…

Well, the Draymond thing seems like an elephant in the room. He has made it pretty clear publicly that you guys have some sort of (divide). That comes to mind.

In February 2022, Green said on his podcast that he believed Barnes “don’t like me for KD coming here” and shared that he was the only member of the Warriors’ celebrated core who wasn’t invited to Barnes’ wedding.

And y’all had a little moment late in (Game 1, when words were exchanged), too.

Yeah I mean, that’s just — that was my teammate for four years. There’s probably 36 of those moments (in a game like that).

Fair, but I’ve always wondered where that (relationship) was. When I think about the two of you, I think back to Media Day in 2015. You had chosen not to do the extension, and you’re up at the podium and Draymond comes through, pops his head through the curtain and tells us reporters to be sure and ask you about turning down all that money.

Yeah.

The Warriors had offered Barnes a four-year, $65.6 million deal that would have put him right alongside Green in terms of annual salary — a figure that was deliberately chosen by the Warriors front office to ensure that they were on the same financial playing field. Green had signed a five-year, $82 million extension in the previous July.

But Barnes, who was taken seventh by the Warriors in the same 2012 draft where Green was taken 35th, ultimately signed with the Mavericks on a four-year, $94 million deal the following summer. Two days after Barnes agreed to sign with Dallas, Durant — who was widely known to have been recruited by Green — agreed to sign with the Warriors.

To go from that last Warriors season to losing in the Finals, and now he’s the guy recruiting KD and all of that, I was always very curious about how you truly saw that situation.

Yeah, you know, I think that’s — maybe we’ll unpack that later in the series. Maybe I’ll be a guest on the podcast, and maybe, maybe, him and I can just talk it out. I don’t know.

Barnes is smiling now…

How much sarcasm is in that comment? Would you sit down with him and go down memory lane? I mean he did a pod last night…

Would I sit down with him? I mean, I assume it’d be you, me and him.

Oh, OK. Let’s do it.

Maybe later in this series.

He’s still smiling…

No, I mean, to me, I relish these moments, just in competition. I think that anytime you go into a playoff series, and anytime you have a chance to play the defending champs who are in your division, right up the road, to me that’s what makes it the most special. Obviously yes, is it good to share a bond, an experience, the chemistry and all the success — some that we had together, and then that they’ve had as a group.

Yeah. But for me, it’s just that if you want to compete, you want to go against the best. Regardless of records and seedings or anything like that, they are defending champs. Honestly, that’s what gets me excited to play. Going back to the original thing about the dinner, I think that’s what I was expressing that night is that you only have so many of these moments in your career where you have a chance to do something. No year is ever guaranteed. We’re not just gonna just roll back in next year and everyone’s gonna be healthy, and we’re gonna play all these games and our starting lineup is gonna have the most minutes — you know the stat I’m talking about.

(You can’t assume) that’s gonna happen, and we’re gonna be right back here. Like, no, you never know. So to bring it full circle, that’s what I tried to impress upon them. That’s the energy that I tried to channel, just being grateful, because I know how long it’s taken me and this franchise to get back.

(Top photo of Harrison Barnes: Noah Graham / NBAE via Getty Images)

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