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OAKLAND – Aaron Miles didn’t have a smooth basketball career. That’s what helps the first-year G-League coach relate to his players on a deep level.

Miles, 34, went undrafted out of the University of Kansas. In Sept. 2005, he signed a non-guaranteed contract with the Golden State Warriors, appearing in 19 games before being released in January.

He went on to play in the G-League, France, Spain, Greece, and Russia before sustaining a torn labrum that required surgery in 2015.

But even though his career didn’t go the way he had dreamt it would, all of the people he met along the way and all of the things he experienced led him to his latest endeavor — an offer in August to be the head coach of the Santa Cruz Warriors.

It all started with an apparent setback.

In 2010, Miles was the last man cut from the Warriors. He played for their G-League affiliate that season and became good friends with then-team manager Ryan Atkinson, who is now the assistant general manager in Santa Cruz.

When the coaching job opened up, Atkinson was the one who threw Miles’ name into the mix.

“You never know,” Miles said. “You treat people with respect no matter who they are. And you be good to people. And they remember that.”

Miles called his first season as a head coach an opportunity to grow and learn.

He looks at scouting reports much differently now — as a player he’d casually glance at them for a few minutes, but as a coach he puts hours of labor into making them and winces anytime a player trashes them. Same things with drills — he’d mindlessly go through them as a player, without realizing just how much thought and strategy the coach had put into every detail.

But being a coach was something that had always piqued his interest.

“As a player point guard, I was the leader on the court, the leader on my team,” Miles said. “I always knew I had it with me. My father was a coach and so was my grandfather. It’s just natural.”

Miles understands what a lot of his players are going through. How deeply they want to make it to the league. How deflating it can be to want so badly to get that call up, and wait and wait and wait. Or get that call — only to soon after be sent back down.

“I know what it’s like to play in the G-league,” Miles said. “I know what it’s like to play in the NBA. I know you’re staying in five-star hotels. And then you play with us and we stay in… [his voice trailed off]. It’s humbling.”

It’s a talk he recently had with Quinn Cook, who signed a two-way contract with the Golden State Warriors in October and has bounced back and forth between the NBA team and Santa Cruz.

“That should be the chip on his shoulder,” Miles said. “I’m going to do whatever it takes to grind and figure out how I can stay up there.”

Miles said Cook is a dynamic scorer with a lot of talent, but there are things he needs to work on, specifically, creating shot opportunities for his teammates and himself off the ball.

“Everybody knows he can score the basketball,” Miles said. “The other day he had 43 points, 11 assists. Me and him talk about this all the time, it’s about impact. How does it impact the whole? Making sure he’s running the show, directing the team, and being that leader.”

As for Damian Jones, a second-year center who is expected to spend the majority of the season in the G-League, Miles said he has a lot of potential.

“He has some physical tools that are unmatched,” Miles said. “For him to utilize that 48-plus minutes, just consistently. That’s what we constantly tell him. We constantly tell him extra effort every possession. Demand the ball down there when you’re in the post, or roll hard, duck hard, whatever the case may be.”

Then there’s Chris Boucher, who signed a two-way contract with the Warriors over the summer. He sustained a torn anterior cruciate ligament during his senior year at Oregon in March, and just appeared in his first G-League game on Jan. 17, finishing with 11 points on four-for-six shooting, three blocks and two rebounds in 15 minutes.

“He’s got a lot to learn, he’s raw,” Miles said. “But with his rawness, he has a ton of energy. And one thing that I love about him is that he’s not afraid to get dunked on.”

Miles said that during a recent game, Boucher didn’t hesitate to defend an opponent who had beaten his man and was about to jam the basketball.

“That was big to see,” Miles said. “…There’s a place for you with that type of energy and effort.”

Miles said he’s really enjoying being a coach. He’s been thrown in the fire and is loving the challenge of figuring things out in real time.

And he’s now a part of something big.

Before he got this gig, he used to look at what the Warriors were doing with awe. Not only have they made The Finals three years in a row, winning two NBA championships in 2015 and 2017. But they also do what they do with class, with enthusiasm, with joy.

“It looks like they enjoying each other, having fun out there,” Miles said. “That’s what it’s about. It’s basketball, it should be fun, enjoyable. That’s the type of organization I want to be a part of.”

Now he’s a key cog in developing players and helping young men realize their dreams. It’s something he can speak on with authority considering in August he just realized one of his.