Golden State Warriors: It’s time for Kevon Looney to become a scorer

Golden State Warriors fans rejoiced on Monday afternoon to the news that Kevon Looney had resigned on a three-year deal.

Kevon Looney, fifth-year center, has shown consistent development over the past two seasons, becoming a key piece in the Golden State Warriors’ previous two playoff runs.

As I explained in my season review of the Warriors’ bigs, Looney carved out a niche for himself on the roster by impressing with solid fundamentals on the defensive end and excellent rebounding.

While Looney’s defense got him a well-deserved (and possibly underpaid) $15 million, the time has arrived for the UCLA product to really step up his game on the offensive end.

Looney will enter the 2019/2020 season with his largest role yet on a squad that will be looking for other scoring options behind Stephen Curry and D’Angelo Russell. This is the perfect opportunity for Looney to be assertive and become more of a scoring threat.

While I admittedly have not historically followed college basketball as closely as the NBA, watching video of Looney at UCLA might surprise a few Dub fans that only know his play on the Warriors.

Looney was much more multi-faceted than what we’ve seen from him thus far.

Watch this highlight from his year at UCLA. You will see Looney do typical Looney things, crashing the glass, getting put-backs, etc., but you’ll also see another side of Looney — taking defenders off the dribble, cross over to pull up jumper, initiating fast breaks, driving and dishing to teammates, and knocking down the long ball.

These are all aspects of Looney’s game that have not quite translated to the NBA yet, however, at times he has shown flashes of his offensive talent during his tenure on the Dubs.

Could there be untapped potential? I say yes.

Look at those silky jumpers. If Looney could develop into a stretch 4/5, the Warriors could exceed the ‘relatively’ low expectations that the league has set for them next year, not to mention the front office would feel exceedingly ecstatic about the rate at which they locked him up for the next three years.

In college, Looney shot an excellent 41.5% from deep. It is possible that the long ball is lying dormant within Looney, waiting to be awoken?

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t expect Looney to start breaking ankles of NBA defenders, but even just a reliable jump shot to complement post moves would do wonders. It’s certainly not unprecedented for a big to develop the three ball later in their career. Look at what other bigs like Blake Griffin and DeMarcus Cousins have done as their careers progressed.

Looney is set to get much more playing time than the 18 minutes per game that he received last season. He looks in line to take over the starting center role off the bat, unless Kerr wants to save him as the sixth man to bring some energy off the bench.

Whereas in the past he might have felt that getting his own on offense wasn’t the priority when he was surrounded by multiple future Hall of Famers, that will not be the case this year. Hopefully Kerr encourages Looney to look for his shot and we see him start to gain confidence as a scorer.

If Looney can break into double digit per game scoring this year and become a double-double machine, the Dubs just may (oddly enough) surprise the Western Conference.