Golden State Warriors: Jonathan Kuminga has potential to be next Kawhi

After dropping to seventh overall in the 2021 NBA draft, Jonathan Kuminga has not failed to impress during his limited time off the bench for the Golden State Warriors. He has pushed himself into being a major role on the number one team in the league in just a few short months.

The Golden State Warriors might have found themselves the next Kawhi Leonard in the budding two-way rising star Jonathan Kuminga.

Kuminga is averaging 4.6 points per game on 47.9% from the field despite only playing 9.3 minutes per game, but this is definitely not what has impressed anybody who has watched him play this season.

Jonathan Kuminga is already a great defender

During these first few months of the season Kuminga has fit right in with the Warriors defensive game plan, being a standout defender every moment he is on the floor.

Kuminga is often tasked with guarding the best forward on the floor when he plays, winning many of those matchups defensively.

Even when head coach, Steve Kerr changes the scheme to play a zone Kuminga rarely makes a misread, this is an impressive skill for a rookie to possess.

Many members of the Warriors organization have been impressed with the rookie, with Defensive Player of the Year frontrunner, Draymond Green even occasionally going in depth with how good Kuminga can be.

The Warriors rookie can already read the defense at an elite level

Jonathan Kuminga has been used as the big in the pick n’ roll combo quite often this season, often times with Curry or Poole. This has led to him having the ball in the post with the defense collapsing on top of him numerous times.

Kuminga has shown the ability to see this coming ahead of time and make the right play by hitting an open teammate during this situation. An ability teammate Draymond Green is often praised for having.

On top of this, Kuminga has made good reads when attacking the basket, driving at the right time, shooting when needed, and has rarely clogged the offense with a bad play.

Jonathan Kuminga’s stats and play style look eerily similar to a rookie Kawhi Leonard

When Clippers superstar Kawhi Leonard was a rookie with the Spurs, he was nowhere near the unstoppable force he is today. In fact, in 24 minutes per game, he only averaged 7.9 points per game.

When Kawhi played nearly 15 minutes more per game, he barely did more in the stat categories than Kuminga does now.

Even more similarities are in store when looking at their playstyle side by side from their rookie seasons. Both played incredible defense, but their jumper wasn’t quite developed enough to make them effective offensively. Both players tend to put pressure on the rim and made the extra pass in a team oriented offensive system as well.

There’s no absolute guarantee that Kuminga will become as polarizing as Kawhi Leonard, however there are many similarities between the two that make this an interesting comparison.