Over the past few days, there’s been some of speculation about an “increasingly dysfunctional atmosphere” brewing between Mark Jackson and the Warriors’ front office. Despite that, Jackson isn’t concerned about not having a contract extension beyond next season and spoke about it on his weekly radio show on KNBR (Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group transcribes):
“There is not a piece of me that’s bothered that an extension has not been agreed upon or anything of that nature…We move forward. I had the deal. They picked up my option for next year, and I think that obviously speaks volumes even though for some folks it doesn’t say anything.”
Several Warriors players have come forward to offer public support for their head coach, including Stephen Curry, who has made it known that he’d like to be consulted by management if a decision were to be made on Jackson’s future. According to Leung, the 26-year-old All-Star also said that he and the rest of the team are behind Jackson “100%”. Jackson was appreciative of their vote of confidence, but acknowledged that he isn’t sure how much the players’ endorsements will influence the front office:
“It depends on who’s making the decision…To some ownership groups or management groups, it means a lot. To some, it doesn’t matter what franchise players or players feel, it’s business as usual. I don’t know…I’m thankful and grateful (for the support), and it says that we’ve got a tied-together group, but with that being said, I’m not even concentrating on that, to be quite honest. It doesn’t matter. That will take care of itself. This is an ownership group that believes in me, pulled the trigger when nobody else decided to make me a head coach, so that will play itself out.”