Jordan Poole’s decision-making and consistency are becoming a problem for the Golden State Warriors

Jordan Poole is struggling to find consistency. Not unexpectedly, Stephen Curry’s intern is finding filling his mentor’s shoes as a difficult task. The pressure to fill the two-time MVP’s shoes has exposed the needed growth to Poole’s game. His skill level is undeniable, but his tendency to dominate the ball to get to the rim is not what Steve Kerr and his staff want from the 23-year-old future of the Golden State Warriors.

Stubborn to a fault with spectacular results at times, Golden State Warriors’ Jordan Poole has put games at risk with his questionable decision-making.

Kerr will remain patient with the young budding superstar, but the path to stardom will require Poole to alter his current mindset. The four-time championship coach was quick to acknowledge a couple of crucial Poole jumpshots down the stretch of Wednesday’s loss against the Detroit Pistons, but there’s little doubt his errant turnovers harmed the team’s chances of victory.

Even in the game beforehand, Poole had some questionable decision-making and shot-selection in the 143-141 double-overtime win against the Atlanta Hawks. Monte Poole, a host of Dubs’ Talk Live and beat writer for the Warriors, assessed Poole’s performance after the Warriors’ dramatic win on Monday.

"“Let’s talk about Jordan Poole; when you’re a point guard, and you have a hot player, in this case, Klay, you try to get him the ball. There were times when Klay was wide open, and Jordan didn’t seem to look for him. He had 6 more turnovers tonight; he had 7 last game.”“He needs to sharpen his focus a little bit and cut back on the dribbling; there were some times tonight when he took up half of the shot clock dribbling the ball. The Warriors don’t play that way, dribbling through half of the shot clock, and tonight he just made some bad decisions, I thought.”"

Poole put the exclamation point on his issues against the Pistons. After a hero three-pointer barely grazed iron, the fourth-year guard had another opportunity with the Warriors down one with less than 20 seconds to play. Unfortunately, all he did was dribble into traffic, stumble, fall, and lose possession.

Klay Thompson’s game-tying three from a perfectly designed, scripted, executed out-of-bounds play, saved Poole and Golden State initially after a pair of Killian Hayes free-throws. It was part of 17 fourth-quarter points for Thompson, with the Warriors also getting a combined 35 points off the bench from Anthony Lamb and Ty Jerome throughout the game.

It was to be a devastating wasted effort as Saddiq Bey hit a prayer three at the buzzer to end the Warriors’ five-game winning streak. Poole’s often been superb in this Curry-less period, including two 40-point games to lead Golden State to victory. Yet this might be his biggest learning moment – a game in which late mistakes came back to ultimately cost the team.