Yahoo Finance Kyle Kuzma's hilariously awful free-throw attempt made the Warriors lose their minds
Kyle Kuzma of the Los Angeles Lakers gave the TV announcers, and the entire Golden State Warriors bench, something they may have never seen before: an airballed technical foul free-throw attempt.
During second quarter of the Lakers' win over the Warriors on Monday night, Kuzma attempted a free throw on a technical foul that didn't just miss, it really, really missed. It missed the rim, it missed the backboard, it missed everything. The commentators calling the game were pretty sure they'd never seen anyone airball a free throw like that before — ever — but the reaction from the Warriors bench was even better. They totally lost their minds. Draymond Green ended up full-out cackling on the sideline.
The Warriors' bench after the air ball 💀 💀 💀 pic.twitter.com/lLqUr9NbTg
— Warriors on NBCS (@NBCSWarriors) March 16, 2021
It doesn't look like anyone on the Warriors had ever seen an airballed technical foul free-throw before, either. In case you haven't, here are a few more angles.
.@dwrightway1 is gonna have some fun talking to @kylekuzma about this one 😂 pic.twitter.com/yAPZeadO3N
— Warriors on NBCS (@NBCSWarriors) March 16, 2021
One of the studio analysts didn't think the Warriors bench was right to react that way to the free throw, saying, "Look at the score." While the Warriors did end up losing 128-97, they were only down by 10 when Kuzma made that hilariously awful free-throw attempt. But honestly, it shouldn't matter if they were leading or losing by 10 or losing by 30. It's their right as human beings to have an exaggerated, outsized reaction when they see something silly, and it will continue to be their right until the NBA makes it illegal for losing teams to have fun.
Kuzma blamed an earthquake
Kuzma's free-throw airball was pretty memorable, so he was asked about it during his postgame media session. Kuzma must have been thinking about how to explain that, and he had a doozy of an answer.
Kyle Kuzma on air-balling the technical foul FT: “San Francisco had a 3.5 magnitude earthquake. Shit started rumbling. I don’t know. I got scared, and it went far off to the left.”
— Jovan Buha (@jovanbuha) March 16, 2021
That's right: Kuzma blamed an earthquake for his worst-ever free-throw attempt. With the game being played in San Francisco, that's not a bad excuse. If it was perhaps the early 1800s, before we had the technology to measure earthquakes, it was possible he could have gotten away with it.
Unfortunately for Kuzma, it's 2021 and we can find out if there's been an earthquake by checking a website or Twitter. According to the SF QuakeBot Twitter feed, there haven't been any earthquakes that powerful in the San Francisco area in the past several days. Kuzma didn't offer an alternate explanation, but if he wants to blame something ridiculous that can't possibly be checked, he could just say that tiny, microscopic elves climbed into his shoes and put him off balance.
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