The Warriors are signing free agent guard De’Anthony Melton to a one-year, $12.8MM contract, sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium (Twitter link).
As cap expert Yossi Gozlan observes (via Twitter), Golden State can complete the deal by using either the non-taxpayer mid-level exception or via sign-and-trade. Either scenario will hard-cap the Warriors at the first apron, which is set at $178.1MM in 2024/25.
$12,822,000 is the full value of the non-taxpayer MLE for next season.
According to Anthony Slater of The Athletic (Twitter link), the Warriors have long been fans of Melton and believed he wasn’t optimally utilized when they faced Memphis in the playoffs a couple years ago.
A 6’2″ combo guard with a 6’8″ wingspan, Melton earned $8MM last season in the final campaign of a four-year, $35MM contract that declined over time. He’ll earn a raise next season with Golden State and an opportunity to boost his value ahead of 2025 free agency if he performs well with the Warriors.
Melton has been a valuable role player over the past four seasons, averaging 10.3 PPG, 3.9 RPG, 2.7 APG and 1.5 SPG while shooting 38.3% from three-point range in 240 regular season games over that span (24.5 MPG). The primary reason the 26-year-old only received a one-year deal is he was limited to just 38 games last season with the Sixers due to a back injury, making the signing somewhat risky for Golden State.
Still, if Melton is healthy, he could provide an infusion of youth, defense and athleticism to the Warriors. And his salary is large enough that even though they’ll only have his non-Bird rights a year from now, they could still make him a competitive offer in 2025 free agency, assuming things go well for both sides.
The 46th pick of the 2018 draft, Melton has played for Phoenix, Memphis and Philadelphia over the course of his six NBA seasons.
Now they good
Melton early bird right 2025/26
limited to giving him a 75% raise on his 2025/26 salary., that would be about 4 years $100 million?
The difference between Melton and Josh Breen is wisdom, IMO
I don’t want Josh Green
What Warriors get from Klay Thompson?
my guess
TPE and 1 Second
Mavs have few picks remaining to trade
non bird right
Trade is not yet done
Warriors get nothing in return
No picks, no player, nothing
@sillivan , in addition to a couple of 2nd round picks, they got something huge: a $16M trade exception.
That effectively raises their cap space by $16M immediately, so long as the players are acquired by trade.
OH MY GOD THIS IS HUGE, if Melton can stay healthy this is a huge W for gsw
how? they are still going to lose to Denver, they cant stop bigs with a bunch of guys who are 6’5″ or under.
Then in your case it’s a good thing Denver isn’t the only team that the Warriors have to play next season.
What up with this 0 IQ reply? GSW has to beat Denver and other teams with bigs to make the Finals? You know this, as do I, you are just trolling and being an online debatelord, the worst kind of poster, so here is a mute for you, and I strongly suggest everyone else mute this TROLL too.
ChuckTROLL1 more like it. Grow up.
LOL, davey commenting on people’s IQ? I don’t think that’s a hole you want to travel down, bud.
Woe is me! If he does this will be the third or fourth account he’s muted me from.
A’Sfan/StephWins/Dave wants me to grow up?
Okay they’ll just loose to Tims or OKC with ease. Let alone the Griz after a season without Ja. I don’t even fancy this warriors over Pels or Kings. Steph can’t do it alone. Kumminga still needs to prove he’s at least a #2, wiggins is cooked. Melton will not change the team their window well and truly closed. Be lucky to get play in again.
Denver gotta worry about their shooting cause they couldnt recover from losing Bruce Brown and now they will also have to recover from losing KCP, looking rough
They didn’t have any size 2 years ago when they beat Denver several times, and when they knocked them out of the playoffs every year before that too. They’ve never been “BIG” and even with Bogut they weren’t big either because him didn’t play big game anyway. Plus, they are trying to add Markennen so if that happens we would be better. With Melton, we get back to defense as a priority.
Yes,
Melton is worth about $17 million a year, IMO
KCP get $22 million a year
Paul George = Harris + Melton
76ers don’t improve much, they are 5-8 seed in the East
Your opinion is obviously tarnished by the pathetic way the Lakers are treading water as teams around league attempt to upgrade. Los angeles Lakers are no longer relevant as evidenced by lebrons offer and no takers. Sorry charlie silliness.
GSW = didnt make playoffs last year after having too small a roster
GSW = still have not addressed this problem that sunk their season last year
Melton is 6’2″ he cant defend bigs, what are we doing here???
Rebuilding, no duh
Starts with getting rid of luxury tax
Rebuilding with Curry and Green in their primes is useless. Trade them both then if you arent serious about winning.
It’s coming very soon… they wasted last 2 yrs not developing their young players
Kerr and the GSW front office have failed Curry harder than Jackson ever did.
Davey, have you considered these points. ONE. Thompson is a guard and you just traded him so you need….a…drumroll…a guard to replace him. TWO you aren’t going to get a quality big in a trade for Thompson, because…drumroll…a team would need a big man to replace said big man and THREE if you expect another team to offer GSW a quality big then it’s likely NOT going to happen because other teams want to keep….drumroll…quality bigs. I’m a drumroller and not a dumbtroller.
This guy is a dipstick who has spent years blaming Kerr and a lack of size for the warriors woes. He said the same thing in 2022 right up until they won. He can make new accounts all he wants, still the same homer.
Also pushing for them to trade Curry …. LOL
I have considered that GSW has a million guards and no bigs and lost a guard they could easily replace internally with many options.
The Warriors have won before with small ball. Why can’t they do it again?
Because the rest of the league figured them out and figured out how to neutralize it? Joker time? Tatum time? Its why we have been useless the last 2 seasons?
Do you mean Jayson Tatum? He’s a Small Forward. Denver/Jokic lost in the 2nd round.
Shot selection and injured/old Klay and the shell of Wiggins playing *way* too many minutes were why the Warriors lost the last two seasons. Poole shot the Warriors out of games in ’23 and Klay in’24 (especially the playoffs/play-in, respectively), while being negatives on defense.
@EonADS I feel you will calm me down about this eventually but in the last two seasons, I felt GSW had the roster to contend, and they simply underperformed – if Dray and Wiggins played 82 games each and were good, we likely would have at least made the WCF.
This season with this roster at full strength, and the same insane targeting of too many 6’2″ guys in the offseason that didnt work with Donte or CP3, I do not have that feeling if we do not get Lauri or an elite performer. This isn’t a contender unless we add an elite performer. A guy who can get you 30+ easily and play even defense.
Wiggins sucked last year. Everyone knows that.
The first part is fair, but that goes for every team, really. The Nuggets couldn’t contend when Murray was missing. The Cavs couldn’t keep up their contending pace with injuries slowing them down (they probably did the best against the Celtics in the playoffs even without Allen and Mitchell). The Sixers have always had that problem. The Knicks had the same thing. Sh*t happens.
I don’t think Lauri is the best fit; he’s a great shooter who can rebound, but he’s not a great defender at his size (average, but not much more). The Warriors need to figure out a trade for an elite wing or add size to go with Looney/Draymond/Kuminga, and even then, I don’t think they’re a championship team anymore. Getting younger and faster is a good step, as that has been a problem for a while, but with Wiggins being an albatross on the cap, they can’t contend. They signed themselves into a corner.
You know what also hurts defending bigs…Draymond Green missing like 40 games…
Anyway, it’s clear this is leading to some sort of trade involving multiple guards, and they still need to address the 3/4 spot with someone that can hopefully complement Kuminga/wiggins/draymond, with spacing and defense
Batum is gone, but there are still a couple of options.
Also, the kid they drafted is a strong paint defender/good with verticality at the rim
@Davey J , gotta have two PG’s along with Steph, and the surround him with ball handlers and defenders so he can play off-ball as necessary.
Melton started for the past 2 years (except when he was injured.) A strength was ability to play alongside Harden (year before) and Maxey (this year), allowing them to play off the ball.
Unlike CP3 and Klay, Melton has straps.
@aristotle
We had 2-way Chiozza as Curry’s only true backup PG the year we won the title in 2022, so we don’t really “need” backup PGs – Draymond (point-center) and Podz play PG, so we already are covered there internally. However, your point about Melton is a good one though, my big target was Marcus Smart for all the reasons you said, and Melton is kind of like Smart in a lot of ways. Age 26 Melton is clearing both CP3 and Klay defensively in 2025, so, there’s that. Its just a rough fit being we have too many guards as it is.
Adding Lauri would 100% turn my frown upside down though!
Window closed!
Good player, I was hoping sixers could keep him but he has a history of back issues.
Good thing it’s only a one-year deal. I see he didn’t play a full season last year.
And he has trouble scoring with that low overall field goal percentage, but his shot is okay from three.
Melton is far better than
Isaiah Joe, Thunder
Buddy Hield, 76ers
Malik Beasley, Bucks
WHAT !!!?
No, seriously no.
Dray and Curry will be next
This dudes a dog Gary, if he can stay healthy you’ll love the improved perimeter D your getting from Melton over Klay
Ok…, I guess I was just hoping to bag an elephant but with the Warriors money thing I guess you take who you can get. Thanks for the positive outlook on this particular player it will help moving forward. I appreciate it.
Melton can hit the three,long armed defense and will chip in with a few rebounds. Nice pick up .
He was one of my low key breakout players this off-season I thought would be Mle or below ( like Ddv last year )
I’ve actually got him in my top 20 ( reasonably ) available free agents this off-season over a lot of more recognizable names
Can’t blame ya on the elephant tho , still early tho we are gonna see a lotta trades post July 4 imo league wide
I had hom 5th on my list for (hopeful potentially reasonable options in their range, b/c of his injury) the Heat, and arguably the guys ahead of him probably weren’t mostly attainable, and neither was he
Melton’s a very good player. Not that far fetched to rather have him on you team than Thompson, depending on need.
Yes, much better fit than Klay. We needed a bkup PG and complement to Steph with CP3 gone. We got that in Melton, who is also a plus defender.
We have plenty of other guys to take Klay’s minutes at the 3/2: Kuminga, Moody, Wiggins, Podz, GP2.
We have nobody that can replace CP3 other than Podz. Melton fills 1 of our 2 greatest positions of need.
100%. Again, there are still moving parts b/c now they have redundancies on their roster, but it obviously points to some sort of potential trade and Gary, yoy should remember when I told you about GP2. Melton is a really good player, and is probably only available at this amount b/c he got hurt last year
“the Warriors have long been fans of Melton and believed he wasn’t optimally utilized when they faced Memphis in the playoffs a couple years ago.”
So you block Podziemski and Moody with a guy who isn’t going to help us to the playoffs, as we have to go big to do that, great, just great….
Melton is at best a Donte Divencenzo clone, and GSW missed the playoffs with Donte.
Complete opposite of donte. In fact the only thing they have in common is lungs.
The Warriors made the playoffs with DiVincenzo as their 3rd/4th guard. They beat Sacramento in the 1st round and then got eliminated by the Lakers in the 2nd round.
Correct, but for me, its no ring, no care. All I see are small ball lineups that win no rings in this post-2022 NBA where bigs dominate and its up to front offices to counter them defensively and offensively.
What bigs would have played against a team like Boston…
@Davey J , “small ball”? Melton started aalongside Joel Embiid for the last two years, played at Memphis, with biggest front line in league before that.
Kerr will absolutely play a rotation of Jackson-Davis, Payton II, Melton, Podz and Steph together, and it will get destroyed, bet on it.
Donte was their best bench player.
The Warriors went to the 2nd round with Donte. They lost in the 2nd round because of Jordan Poole.
He has a lot of Marcus smart in him, with better shooting, and less with the ball in his hands. An elite steals guy, like I said about GP2 before they originally signed him at the end of the season before they won. He is an amazing complement to Curry, but they also already have multiple options there
This tells me there are trade(s) lined up
@formerlyz I pray you are correct. Melton isnt a bad player, its just a rough fit on a team with so many guards already here – we said this exact same thing last year and the year before btw.
Small ball does not work anymore, GSW has to move on from it.
I think the Celtics have some qualms about that idea that they didn’t win, considering…they did
Also, I have never said that about bigs, ever. I said the same things I’m saying now, which also weren’t addressed. They need a 3/4 that can defend and shoot that doesn’t need the ball in hisbhands to complement wiggins/kuminga/draymond. I did say they kept an extra guard though, but I said it was in favor of players they needed at those positions, not some magical 5 they don’t need
Boston did not win in 2022, they got destroyed by small ball (Poole/Curry/Klay/Dray/Otto), then they bought in Kristaps and won it all.
They won 2 weeks ago…
With Thompson and Paul gone there are plenty of minutes to be had at the two guard spots. Melton will probably be Curry’s primary backup.
You dont watch GSW, do you? Melton will be playing power forward in idiot Kerr’s small ball lineups that havent worked since the the 2022 Finals.
You’re the one who didn’t know the Warriors made the playoffs in 2023. I clearly know more about the NBA (not just GSW) than you do. You are just a Curry worshipper.
Small ball works if you play defense. The Warriors had the most dominant big man in NBA history and couldn’t win a ring.
The state of “what wins” changes every year. Poole/Curry/Klay won one time, but couldn’t make it happen again, as they got nullified by one of the many teams that figured out how to beat them (switch your big onto one of the smalls, get unlimited buckets at the rim). Jokic’s big man dominance blew by GSWs small ball to the title the next year, and now Boston having like 6 all-stars in their primes all at once showed us another way.
Its sad and embarrassing how far away GSW is from Boston right now, after 2022 we clearly went and took a nap, while Boston did work…
So, I guess you are saying that Draymond and Curry were wrong when the said turnovers and inconsistent defense is what hurt them last year. By the way, they played their best games when Draymond was at the 5.
Amazing fit, and player, but they have 17000 guards now, 2-3 of them with redundancies, after a year where they had 1 too many already
They have trades on the table, clearly
Agree , great player not the most snug fit but like you said trade season coming and it could all round right into form really quick
I’ve also really liked Lindy Waters for a few years now, as I said previously in other threads…I think people are ignoring the defense, playmaking, and spacing they have at the 1-3 spots right now, with actual depth too, in case Curry gets hurt
People really keep forgetting how many games Draymond missed. I’m ignoring everything else right now; Draymond Green missing that sort of time, especially for no actual reason, is how you end up a couple of games out of a 5-6 seed
They have exactly the same number as guards as before. Melton replaces CP3. An NBA roster will carry no less than 3 guys who can play PG.
The logjam was at the 3, not the guard position. They are committed to making JK the starting 3 this year.
Klay was no longer a guard, he was a 3, which meant his minutes came mostly at the expense of JK, but also of Wiggins and Moody.
In Melton, Curry, and Podz you have 3 guards that can play PG or off the ball. Any 2 of them can play together at once. They are also our 3 PG’s.
Only Moody is regarded as a “pure” SG. He’s projected to get more minutes this year. That’s 4 guards
GP2 has never handled the ball for us. He has no trade value other than his expiring contract since he’s injured often and is 31 years old. That’s 5 guards.
Wiggins and Kuminga are 3’s, JK can play the 4 in small ball lineups.
can play that alongside
Corey Joseph was on the roster…
Okay hold on. They’re still trying to go after Lauri Markenan !!
Ok.
All this panicking and they’re not done. Panicking by me I mean. LOL
This chaos has me talking to myself.
Ya there are a bunch of moving parts around the league right now…That being said, I’m getting a little nervous as a Hsat fan, especially after they already made a really, really bad draft pick at 15. At least GS got 2 guys near the top of my list lol
The dubs will nit make the playoffs. Give Steph his respect and trade him. This need to be a full blown rebuild . Why wait. Steph’s and draymond will hopefully bring us a future.
We will be wasting Steph away
Rebuild? It’s been in process for a few years, you just weren’t paying attention.
1) Team age. Warriors average team age is now 26 years old. Moving off CP3, Klay, and Saric means only Steph, Dray and GP2 are over 30. And GP2 will be gone after this season. Melton is 26 years old, coming off 2 years of starting (unless injured) for Philly.
2) Young starters and rotation players on rookie scale contracts. Warriors have 3 young starters and 2 young rotation players who project to get better every year for the next few seasons. Total annual salary: $22M
Warriors will start JK (21), Podz (20), Jackson-Davis (23) this year. Their rotation consists of Moody (22) and Melton (26). (We can exclude “mid-career” Looney (28) and Wiggins (29) from the analysis.)
3) To be a championship contender, they will need at least one Top 10 player to replace Steph. Not easily done, but when you have all your draft picks and $150M in cap space, you’re in the game.
The worst thing is Steph’s trade value is so massive there isnt anyone out there who will match it. Boston isnt trading Tatum and Brown for Steph and Dray.