Jason Kidd was not in the mood to discuss his coaching philosophies on Saturday night.
The Dallas Mavericks bench boss spoke to reporters shortly after a 111-107 loss to the Houston Rockets, and when asked about "national criticism" for playing 2025 first-overall pick Cooper Flagg at point guard, he didn't mince words.
"Criticism? That's your opinion," Kidd said. "You guys write that bull----. I've done this. I've played the game.
"I played it at a very high level. I know what the (expletive) I'm doing. I don't give a (expletive) what you guys write because you guys have never played the game. I build players, so I know what the (expletive) I'm doing. To take criticism, it only makes me better. Because if I wasn't doing it right, you guys wouldn't be poking holes in what I've done."
Kidd then left the podium after taking no further questions.
His comments came after the Mavericks' fourth consecutive loss — dropping to 19-30 on the season, 11th in the West — despite back-to-back stellar performances from the rookie phenom.
On Thursday, Flagg put up 49 points and 10 rebounds in 38 minutes, but Dallas fell to the Charlotte Hornets on the back of Kon Knueppel's career-high 34-point night. Despite losing to his once Duke University teammate, Flagg made some history as his near-50-point performance set a new single-game scoring record for a teen in NBA history.
The 19-year-old then followed that up with a 34-point, 12-rebound and 5-assist outing against Houston on Saturday while losing to the Texas rival.
While Flagg has undoubtedly seen his fair share of successes — averaging 19.5 points, 6.5 rebounds, 4.1 assists (fourth among rookies) and 1.3 steals — as Kidd's empowered him to handle the ball despite entering the league as a forward, the youngster has also faced some growing pains.
He's second amongst rookies with his 2.2 turnovers per game and his minus-2.7 rank sits 11th-worst in the NBA for first-year players (min. 25 games). Those struggles came into the spotlight in that Thursday loss to the Hornets when, moments after tying the game with a triple, Flagg turned the ball over and fouled Knueppel, who then drained the game-winning free throws.
Flagg isn't the first forward Kidd has encouraged to play on-ball more early in his career, however, as the 52-year-old once pushed a rookie Giannis Antetokounmpo to do the same when he was coaching the Milwaukee Bucks.
Kidd was ultimately replaced by Mike Budenholzer when Antetokounmpo reached his two-time MVP level, but not before helping the Greek superstar win Most Improved Player in 2017 while making all-NBA (second-team), all-defence and all-star the same year.
Time will tell if he can replicate that success with Flagg, but it appears he won't be changing his approach anytime soon either way.
