Bike rides and Balkan music: Klay Thompson is embracing a fresh start with the Mavericks

KLAY THOMPSON BRIEFLY considered bringing a Boston Whaler to Dallas, figuring it would be a good boat to dock at one of the local lakes, allowing him to indulge in his most prominent off-court passion after leaving the San Francisco Bay Area for his new NBA home.

But Thompson thought better of the idea. He wanted to immerse himself in a new experience after choosing to join the Dallas Mavericks in free agency, not attempt to recreate the one he had during his 13-year tenure with the Golden State Warriors.

“Don’t need a boat,” Thompson told ESPN recently while relaxing at his American Airlines Center locker, situated a couple of stalls to the right of Luka Doncic‘s locker and a couple to the left of Kyrie Irving‘s. “That’s what summertime is for. I got enough cold-water boating in the Bay to last me some years.”

When Thompson wants a water fix and some fresh air these days, he hops on his bicycle and pedals a half-hour from his Dallas home to White Rock Lake, a suitable relaxation replacement to cruising the open water in his Axopar 37 Cabin, which Thompson dubbed the “Nordic Knife” and “Splash Express.”

Thompson, who will be feted by his former franchise when he returns to San Francisco on Tuesday night to face the Warriors for the first time (10 p.m. ET, TNT), isn’t searching for peace of mind on those occasional bike rides to the lake.

He said he is not just content to have closed the book on his phenomenal Golden State journey, which featured four NBA championship runs alongside Stephen Curry and Draymond Green. Thompson felt it was necessary to finish his career with another franchise, after the doubts about his future with the Warriors weighed heavily on his shoulders all last season.

“We’re all human,” said Thompson, who endured two devastating injuries and a diminished role over his final five years with Golden State. “Every pro athlete’s human, and uncertainty can bear on you.”

Thompson chose the Mavericks over the Los Angeles Lakers, who also recruited him in free agency, because he believed Dallas provided him the best chance to pursue a fifth championship ring. He believed he could be the missing player after the Mavs, fresh off their five-game NBA Finals loss to the Boston Celtics, promised him a starting spot. He craved the opportunity to prove that, at 34 years old and with two major injuries on his medical records, he could still play a major role on a contender.

“Honestly, it’s rejuvenated me and done something I needed bad just for my mental and my career,” Thompson said. “So, I really feel the love here, and I feel highly valued that I can do great things.”

SCOTTIE PIPPEN CAME to mind as Thompson was coming to terms with his decision to eliminate the possibility of returning to the Warriors.

Thompson lights up when he talks about when Pippen, a six-time champion as Michael Jordan‘s co-star with the Chicago Bulls, signed with the Portland Trail Blazers in 1999. Thompson was 9 at the time living in Portland, where his father, Mychal, played for the first eight years of his career after the Blazers selected him No. 1 in the 1978 NBA draft. Thompson was ecstatic that the local team had added such an icon, one of his favorite players from childhood.

“That was like the best day of my life,” he said. “That was so amazing.”

Pippen was 34 at the time, the same age Thompson is now. While Pippen wasn’t able to earn another ring in Portland, his success there serves as inspiration for Thompson.

“He did a lot for the Blazers. They were three minutes away from a Finals appearance,” Thompson said in reference to Portland’s Game 7 loss to the Lakers in the 2000 Western Conference finals.

Pippen had a bridge season with the Houston Rockets between the Bulls being broken up after “The Last Dance” championship run and his arrival in Portland. Pippen also had hard feelings toward his original franchise that Thompson is adamant he does not hold for the Warriors — no matter how uncomfortable he felt at times in his final season with Golden State.

“I’m so grateful for everything I experienced at Golden State,” Thompson said. “But I mean, I’ve seen some of my favorite athletes pivot and have tremendous success. When I think of Shaq[uille O’Neal] leaving the Lakers and winning a ring or Tom Brady winning one with Tampa Bay, it’s been done before.

“That was my main goal at this point in my career. I just want to win, and this team is so close. I just wanted to be a part of that when July 1 hit [free agency]. It’s human nature to think about your future. As present as you’re supposed to be, we’re all human. We all think about that. Now, to know I’m locked in for a few years here, it allows me to be free.”

Thompson had endured a choppy final five years with the Warriors. He missed the first half of that span after suffering a torn ACL in his left knee in the 2019 NBA Finals then a ruptured right Achilles tendon while training during the following offseason. He recovered to be a major contributor to the Warriors’ 2022 championship run — scoring 32 points in the Western Conference finals elimination win over the Mavs — but said he felt unappreciated when the front office prioritized other players in the following two years.

The Warriors discussed a two-year, $47 million contract extension before last season, but a deal was never close to happening, sources told ESPN. Green had signed a four-year, $100 million extension months earlier, but the Warriors never indicated the willingness to make that kind of commitment to Thompson at this stage of his career. His potential departure loomed over the franchise last season — especially when coach Steve Kerr had Thompson come off the bench in February and March for the first time since his rookie year. When Golden State put Thompson on the backburner while attempting to pull off a sign-and-trade for Paul George, his exit became a sure thing.

After meeting with the Mavericks and Lakers on the first night of free agency, Thompson accepted a three-year, $50 million offer from Dallas, even though the Lakers had discussed a longer-term deal for more money. He had said his goodbyes to his Golden State teammates days before, specifically asking Curry and Green not to lobby the front office to make an eleventh-hour attempt to persuade him to stay.

The Warriors and Mavs ended up working with the Charlotte Hornets, Denver Nuggets, Philadelphia 76ers and Minnesota Timberwolves to tie a series of separate personnel moves into a record-setting six-team sign-and-trade. As part of that deal, Golden State acquired Buddy Hield to help fill the void left by Thompson’s departure. Hield is off to a spectacular start for the 8-2 Warriors, averaging 18.0 points per game while shooting a career-high 48.8% from 3-point range.

“I think about the guys I won with all the time, and I talked to them before I made a decision,” Thompson said while sitting at his locker in Dallas, mentioning Curry, Green, Andre Iguodala, Andrew Wiggins and Kevon Looney. “They were very supportive of it. They understand, and there’s no bad blood at all.

“With what we did, I’ll have a bond forever with those guys. It’s just a special bond. That’s what I’m trying to do here. When you win, that lasts forever. And that’s greater than any salary you could ever earn, in my opinion.”

OVER HIS 13-YEAR tenure in Golden State, Thompson developed a familiar pregame routine. He’d hit the court a little more than an hour before tipoff. Warriors assistant Chris DeMarco would feed him the ball as hip hop and rap — “Stir Fry” by Migos was a nightly staple — carried throughout the facility.

Now, in American Airlines Center, the routine is similar, but small details are different. Mavs assistant coach Jared Dudley, not DeMarco, is on the court with Thompson. And there’s another new twist to his pregame shooting session, at least before home games: About five minutes into it, Balkan folk and pop music begins blaring over the arena speakers as a certain Slovenian superstar takes the court.

“It’s so familiar for you — routine, routine — and then you’re in a new city and you’re in a new environment,” Thompson’s new teammate Irving told ESPN, speaking from experience after changing franchises three times in his career, the first time following a six-year run with the Cleveland Cavaliers that featured three Finals appearances and the lone title in the team’s history.

Kevin Durant, Thompson’s former Warriors teammate, can relate to what Thompson is going through in Dallas.

Durant has been through the experience of leaving a longtime home multiple times, although the circumstances surrounding his early-prime departure from the Oklahoma City Thunder to the Warriors before bouncing — two titles, three Finals appearances and a few years later — to the Brooklyn Nets then to the Phoenix Suns are drastically different.

“I felt like he loved playing for the Warriors,” Durant told ESPN, “but sometimes in your life you just want to experience something new outside of basketball — living in a different city, mingle with different people, mix yourself up with different organizations. I think that’s healthy for your development as a human being. Sometimes players take advantage of that more so than just like, ‘All right, I don’t like my team basketballwise.'”

Durant said the most difficult aspect of adjusting to a new franchise is not the new city or the new teammates. It’s leaving behind the athletic trainers and strength coaches who know your body as well as you do and the assistant coaches who can conduct your post-practice and pregame shooting routines with their eyes closed and getting to know the new people filling those essential roles.

Thompson, however, described that part of the process as “pretty seamless” and “awesome,” crediting the Mavericks organization with being accommodating and welcoming.

During the preseason, Dallas coach Jason Kidd, who changed franchises four times during his Hall of Fame career as a point guard, cautioned that it would be an “82-game journey” to incorporate Thompson into the Mavericks’ system that revolves around the creative brilliance of Doncic and Irving. Kidd said the Mavs would consistently tinker with ways to mesh what Thompson does best — relentless off-ball movement that often results in catch-and-shoot opportunities for a player who ranks sixth in NBA history in 3-pointers made — with the isolation and pick-and-roll mastery of Doncic, in particular.

But that has never been a worry for Thompson. He came to Dallas with the understanding that he’d fill a complementary role for a team that wanted to upgrade the 3-point shooting around its stars, preparing himself to be patient, anticipating that his shot attempts would fluctuate from game to game.

It didn’t take long to see Thompson’s potential impact for Dallas — and how he could benefit from playing alongside two of the league’s most productive playmakers. He scored 22 points in the season-opening win over the San Antonio Spurs, going 6-of-10 from long range to set a Dallas record for 3s made in a franchise debut. Doncic fed Thompson on four of his 3s that night.

“From an on-court standpoint, it’s been even easier playing with such great talent,” Thompson said after his hot start, as he averaged 19.7 points and shot 45.5% on 3s in his first three games for Dallas. “My game fits this team so well as far as stretching the floor, playing hard defense and being that two-way guy again.”

On one occasion in the opener, Doncic started jogging back on defense and celebrating as soon as his pass hit Thompson’s hands. The Spurs had busted their defensive coverage on the Mavericks’ “Stack” play, a set known throughout the league as a Spain pick-and-roll, where a spot-up threat sets a back screen on the opposing big man before popping out to the wing as a wrinkle on the traditional pick-and-roll.

In this instance, Victor Wembanyama and the other two Spurs directly involved in the coverage were all in the paint when Doncic delivered his pass, focused on clogging the All-NBA guard’s driving lane and preventing the lob pass to springy 7-foot center Dereck Lively II. There wasn’t a Spur within 15 feet of Thompson when he caught the ball on the right wing, dribbled once and swished a shot that was as open as any of the 2,510 3s he has made in his career.

“Happy I made it,” Thompson said with a grin that night as he folded the box score into a paper airplane during his postgame news conference, a custom he has carried over from his Warriors tenure. “Made [Doncic] not look stupid.”

But Thompson has experienced some of the inconsistency that Kidd cautioned would likely occur. He is averaging 13.8 points per game — his lowest since his rookie season — and shooting a career-low 35.4% from 3-point range with the Mavericks sitting at .500 (5-5) entering their San Francisco visit, one he tried to downplay.

“It’ll be good to see people you grinded with, obviously. But to me, it’s just another regular-season game in November,” Thompson said after Sunday’s loss in Denver, where he was 4-of-13 from the floor.

Other high-profile players in somewhat similar situations recently — having left their original franchises after lengthy stints, albeit without the championship hardware Thompson earned — haven’t been able to make smooth transitions with their new teams. But there were extenuating circumstances — including injuries, personal matters, positional changes, franchise turmoil — in the cases of players such as Minnesota’s Rudy Gobert, Milwaukee‘s Damian Lillard and Phoenix’s Bradley Beal that impacted their adjustments following trades that ended long, decorated tenures with their first teams.

Thompson, on the other hand, is as healthy as he has been in years and happy after getting to pick the place to put him in the best position to add to his legacy.

“You can just kind of see he’s in a different mental space, and I know what that’s like,” Beal told ESPN after the Suns’ win over the Mavericks last month. “He’s been hurt, wants to be him and the situation is what it is [with the Warriors]. He now is in a spot, in a place mentally where he’s just free and clear and you can kind of see that it’s like a little weight off his shoulders and he’s playing freely. He’s playing like Klay.”

Thompson got to leave Golden State on his own terms.

“I just, like, freely thought about it at the end. I was like, ‘Do I have more to give [the Warriors] or would going somewhere else motivate me to add a new chapter to my legacy?'” Thompson said. “And that’s what I decided on. And I haven’t looked back since.”