With Coach Kerr out, how big of a threat is COVID to Warriors’ playoff run?
No testing done on players unless they show symptoms
>SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA – MAY 7: Golden State Warriors head coach
Steve Kerr coachers his team during Game 3 of a second-round NBA
basketball playoff series at Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on
Saturday, May 7, 2022. Kerr tested positive for COVID -19 on Monday
evening. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
>SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA – MAY 7: Golden State Warriors head coach
Steve Kerr coachers his team during Game 3 of a second-round NBA
basketball playoff series at Chase Center in San Francisco, Calif., on
Saturday, May 7, 2022. Kerr tested positive for COVID -19 on Monday
evening. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
By JULIA PRODIS SULEK | jsulek@bayareanewsgroup.com | Bay Area News Group
PUBLISHED: May 11, 2022 at 4:14 p.m. | UPDATED: May 11, 2022 at 7:39 p.m.
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2022/05/11/with-coach-kerr-out-how-big-of-a-threat-is-covid-to-warriors-playoff-run/

A correction to an earlier version of this article has been appended to
the end of the article.

The talk of the Golden State Warriors’ rough-and-tumble playoff series
with Memphis had been all about elbow injuries and wounded knees — until
Coach Steve Kerr landed in quarantine with COVID-19.

With coronavirus cases surging again in the Bay Area, a COVID outbreak
in the locker room could be just as devastating as the injuries that
knocked the Warriors’ Gary Payton II or sidelined Grizzlies star Ja Morant.

Just hours before tonight’s Game 5 tipoff, the Warriors reported all
their players were good to go, with none showing signs of COVID.

Warriors assistant Mike Brown will replace Kerr on the bench tonight as
he did in Monday’s 101-98 victory after Kerr tested positive hours
before the game. When the two talked on Wednesday, Kerr told Brown he
was “feeling OK,” but the Warriors have said little about whether their
head coach has any symptoms from his bout with the virus.

When Kerr returns is still uncertain, said Raymond Ridder, the Warriors’
senior vice president of communications. NBA rules say he must test
negative twice 24 hours apart or reach a certain CT (Cycle Threshold)
value, a number that can be gleaned from certain PCR tests and indicates
how much virus an infected person carries.

In the meantime, per NBA protocols, the players won’t be tested unless
they show symptoms, Ridder said. During the surge of cases that started
in December from the omicron wave, Warriors players Draymond Green,
Jordan Poole, Andrew Wiggins and Damion Lee all were sidelined after
testing positive.

Dr. John Swartzberg, a Warriors fan and infectious disease professor
emeritus with UC Berkeley, said he wouldn’t be surprised if at least one
player comes down with COVID in the next day or two. But that might be
hard to tell if only people with symptoms are tested.

“I can see how it would be in their best interest,” he said, “not to do
increased testing.”

While he said he is “not advocating for the Warriors to do more
testing,” he did say after learning about Kerr’s infection the team
should have been wearing masks – at least on the bench during Monday’s
game – and “of course nobody was doing that.”

Few fans appeared to be wearing masks at Chase Center in San Francisco
either.

Kerr himself had been seen around the Chase Center wearing a mask in
recent days, including on the sidelines of the Warriors’ Game 3 win
Saturday night.

In an email, Ridder said the team is following “all of the required NBA
COVID rules and most of their recommendations.”

Those include hand cleaning, sanitizing equipment and “testing anyone
who has symptoms. We’ve been doing all of this for months and will
continue to do so. And, everyone in our traveling party, including all
players, have been vaccinated.”

Which recommendations aren’t the team following completely?

Social distancing in certain spaces, he said.

If the players were following CDC guidelines instead, and had close
contact with their coach when he started getting sick, “they should be
wearing a mask when they’re in public and they should test day three to
five after the exposure,” Swartzberg said.

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“In the ideal world it would be nice if there were policies everyone
could be consistent with, but it hasn’t been that,” Swartzberg said.
“We’re talking about the ideal, but we’re not in an ideal world.”

Correction: May 11, 2022 An earlier version of this article incorrectly
reported that the Chase Center still requires fans to wear masks unless
they are eating or drinking.

--
Julia Prodis Sulek | Enterprise reporter
Julia Prodis Sulek has been a general assignment reporter for the Bay
Area News Group, based in San Jose, her hometown, since the late 1990s.
She has covered everything from plane crashes to presidential campaigns,
murder trials to immigration debates. Her specialty is narrative
storytelling.