Warriors’ Jonathan Kuminga gets brutally honest on benching

“Stay ready.” That’s been the message the Golden State Warriors have sent to Jonathan Kuminga since his benching.  However, it seems like that message has been lost on the 22-year-old despite Steve Kerr telling reporters that Kuminga’s attitude and energy since his benching has been “fantastic.”

After the Warriors’ 109-94 Game 2 loss to the Houston Rockets, a game in which Kuminga finally saw the floor after Butler left with a pelvic contusion, Kuminga expressed his honest thoughts about his benching and being told to “stay ready.”

“No matter the circumstances I’m in, always got to stay ready,” Kuminga said.

In his return, he scored 11 points in 26 minutes but on 4-0f-12 shooting. “But I feel like I’ve been ready. I hate the fact that everybody got to tell me every other time, ‘be ready, be ready,’ you know? Because in my mental and my mindset, I’m ready. The more you tell me get ready, get ready, it’s kind of irritating, but I’m ready.”

This isn’t the first time Kuminga has aired out his frustrations publicly about his playing time. Back in January 2024, Shams Charania and Anthony Slater reported that Kuminga had “lost faith” in Kerr. His frustrations at that time understandably stemmed from Kerr’s benching of him in the final 18 minutes of the Dubs’ comeback loss to the Denver Nuggets.

After that explosive report, it looked like the Warriors would trade Kuminga that season. But Kerr and Kuminga settled their differences, which has led to this moment where it’s clear Kuminga’s frustrations with his playing time haven’t gone away.

In the same interview, Kuminga talked about the difficulties of his situations, all while repeating the mantra, “stay ready” again and again.

“I work out every day. I played with some of the guys here the other day and I just try to have a good spirit every single day. The more my spirit is where I want, that’s how I stay ready,” Kuminga said. “It is tough, for any player it’s going to be tough, but what am I going to do about it. At the end of the day, what are you going to do about it?

“It’s like I say, you just got to stay ready. Whenever your moment happens, it’s going to happen. But for me it’s kind of… like tough. There’s really nothing I can do about it. You know, can’t complain about it, can’t do anything about it. If I don’t play, it’s the coach’s decision.”

Stephen Curry’s message to Kuminga