The Warriors’ long downturn continued with Monday’s surprising loss at Toronto, but Stephen Curry doesn’t want management to overreact with a trade that’s not in the team’s best long-term interest, writes Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN. After starting the season 12-3, Golden State is now 12th in the West at 19-20 and appears headed for a frantic battle for one of the four play-in spots.
However, Youngmisuk notes that Curry is sticking with a philosophy that the organization has been emphasizing since training camp, which is there will be no panic involved in trade decisions, especially if it means giving up young players and future draft assets.
“Desperate trades or desperate moves that deplete the future, there is a responsibility on allowing or keeping the franchise in a good space and good spot when it comes to where we leave this thing when we’re done,” Curry said. “Doesn’t mean that you’re not trying to get better. It doesn’t mean that you’re not active in any type of search to, if you have an opportunity where a trade makes sense or even in the summer free agency [move] makes sense. You want to continue to get better. Nobody wants to be stale or be in a situation where you’re passing up opportunities. But it doesn’t mean that you’re desperate just flinging assets all around the place just because you want to do something.”
There’s more on the Warriors:
- Coach Steve Kerr made a similar statement at Monday’s shootaround, saying it would be unwise to mortgage the future to give himself, Curry and Draymond Green a shot at another NBA title, per Anthony Slater of The Athletic. Kerr recognizes the need to have young talent such as Jonathan Kuminga, Moses Moody and Brandin Podziemski on hand once he and his veteran stars are gone. “That’s the hard part in addressing all this stuff,” Kerr said. “We’re not giving in. But you have to be realistic organizationally about where you are. And you have to mind what’s coming ahead in the future. I probably won’t be around, but I would tell you, if this organization gave away the next six or seven drafts for a wild swing, that would be the most irresponsible thing that they could do.”
- The front office has engaged in internal discussions about finding a center who can consistently make three-pointers to create more space for Curry and provide better lineup combinations for Green and Kuminga, Slater adds in the same piece. He mentions Nikola Vucevic as a possibility, depending on the price the Bulls would want in return.
- Remarkably, Monday marked the first game that Andrew Wiggins has played in his hometown of Toronto in seven years, according to Sam Gordon of The San Francisco Chronicle. Wiggins rejoined the team on Saturday after missing two games for personal reasons.
dubs should give curry the team when hes done playing as a gesture of gratitude from taking this dump of a franchise to the elite of the NBA. kerr can get lost. draymond gets a statue.
Yes, and a dump it was. Chris Mullin as GM absolutely ruined the franchise with his moves. Don Nelson had to come in and correct a few of them and rework to the roster.
Thankfully, the Warriors drafted Steph Curry as he fell into their laps. I remember they were considering Jonah Hill.., Oops excuse me, Jordan Hill at that spot, but went with Curry. Might’ve been a smoke screen to deter the wolves from picking Curry lol.
Also thankful for Mark Jackson, who instilled the defensive mindset at the beginning of this run.
too many people credited BM with the success of the warriors. It was Jerry West who was the one that inputted on drafting the players. BM drafted a bunch of bad drafts that hurt the warriors today.
Oh yeah, this current run was started by the great Jerry West. That is absolutely 100% a fact.
I think I probably went too far back because the guy mentioned a dump. Michael Pietris Juri Welsh, Todd Fuller Ike Diogo Patrick O’Bryant… Need I go on?
they took that center from the Sudan whos name escapes me now…..one pick ahead of McGrady
Oh my goodness I forgot Adonal Foyle, the 6-10 center who was really a 6-8 center from Colgate, the basketball powerhouse.
How can I forget those bad drafts. Like when Todd Fuller was drafted and he wasn’t even considered a 2nd round pick. All the experts wondered why he was picked.
let’s face it. most of their draft picks outside of Steph, Draymond and Klay have been garbage.
You forgot about Harrison Barnes.
Harrison Barnes was a good player. But he left because he didn’t want to take the $17 million contract that Draymond and Klay accepted. He wasn’t down with the program of staying together. So he left for Dallas and so the Warriors had their checkbook ready for the next guy. Barnes got his 25 million and did his own thing which is fine. He carved out a pretty good NBA career in his own right
…To make way for Kevin Durant. I wonder what would have happened if they hadn’t signed KD. Would they have kept Barnes? They wouldn’t have had to trade Bogut, or renounce the rights to Ezeli.
…. because Barnes declined the option in the signing the off-season prior to Durant. So Barnes became a restricted free agent and the Warriors let him walk so they could do the transaction with Durant.
Gary, what about the immortal Larry Riley?! He drafted Steph in 2009, apparently overcoming resistance from the legendary Chris Cohan, who preferred Brandon Jennings.
West not only drove Klay’s drafting in 2012, but also reportedly talked Riley and Myers out of trading Steph for Chris Paul around June, 2011. West also discouraged trading Klay for Kevin Love.
Oh ya for sure. Good call.
Quick sidenote and I think I’m in the minority in this knowledge, but Don Nelson pulled all the strings for the Warriors in those days.
This was his second go round, but Cohen demanded he have a GM beside him. He didn’t want Nelson to wear too many hats as he did before with the Warriors.
Nelson traded away Murphy and Dunleavy for Jackson and Harrington and fixed a lot of Chris Mullin’s mistakes. Yes Larry Riley was the GM, but it was Don Nelson with the basketball knowledge who wanted Steph Curry and made the decision to draft him.
I think Larry was an assistant coach actually on the bench either with the Warriors or somewhere else but a friend of Nelson so he brought him in to be his yes man and pseudo GM.
That’s good knowledge about Nelly making the call on Steph, I hadn’t heard that.
Lacob was publicly unimpressed with the core of Steph and David Lee, and that was part of why Lacob replaced Riley with the Myers and West combo. Lacob presented the move to DubNation that West was the genius talent evaluator and Myers, not really a basketball guy, was the recruiter. Lacob thought Myers’ rep with players and relationships with their agents could solve the huge problem of getting superstars to come to the Bay.
Lacob sent Myers after Dwight Howard of Orlando in 2011-12. Howard was the superstar Lacob thought could launch the new look, and the Warriors made a huge trade offer, including Steph, but the Lakers made a better offer. IIRC, Steph’s trade value was low at the time because of his ankle problems.
Myers and Lacob did succeed in landing Iguodala, which was a breakthrough, and the Ellis for Bogut trade (which West was supposedly also behind, advocating making room for Steph) worked out.
Also give Myers (and Lacob) much credit for knowing when to replace Jackson with Kerr. But the the credit for Steph staying a Warrior probably goes to West.
Ari, yes, 100%. Everything you write here is spot on as far as I know.
Good insight and knowledge of recent Warriors history.
The worst part is you know GSW is bad at drafting, yet you think Podz has a future in this league.
Dunleavy is good at drafting. Bob Myers was crappy at drafting.
Remember All those flyers he took on those second round picks.., Smilagic, Patrick McCaw, Jacob Evans at the end of the first round one year.., Jordan Bell. All flops.
Actually, it was Curry for Bogut. But, the Buck’s doctor said Curry wasn’t worth it. At least, that was what Curry said.
Yes, Curry did say that because he’s a very humble man and is in no way going to throw Monte Ellis under the bus.
He has much respect for Ellis and his game and the way he reacted to Steph coming in and taking over the guard spot. Ellis Handled it professionally and welcomed Steph so Curry appreciated that very much.
Jerry West laid down the ultimatum that two small guards could never win together and conveniently the Warriors really needed a center.
Andrew Bogut had worn out his welcome in Milwaukee to a certain degree because of his injuries and failure to live up to his number one overall pick status.
I don’t think Nelson ever offered a scenario of take whoever you want, either curry or Ellis. I think it was Monte Ellis out the door the whole time but out of respect for Monte that would never be broadcast publicly today.
No reason to make a trade at this time because the team has so many holes right now. watching Curry over the last couple of months his defense is getting worse. Teams are picking on him and trying to get their better offense player on him in switches. Curry and Heild can not be in the same defensive lineup at the same time.
Kerr defaulting to small ball lineup in every scenario is how this happens. Curry gets switched onto by a bigger player and gets cooked, same with Moody, same with Lindy.
Well, my friends the end is near and it’s time to break it down, that much is clear.
Take Schroder take Green take everyone seen.
Podski too and Jonathan and Moody, even Payton Santos and the lovable Looney.
Kerr can retire and take his assistants with him, leaving just Curry and draft picks which in the end could be slim.
I look forward to 2026 and if all goes well, Dunleavy’s magic could result in seed six?
If you break it down you try to trade away Curry for maximum value so he has a chance for a ring with another team I guess?
It sounds logical, but if you trade Curry, the value of the franchise goes down by billions of dollars.
They’re the second most valuable sports franchise in America right now, Almost $10 billion. If you trade Steph Curry that goes down substantially in my opinion.
Yes, it would help the roster and the future of wins and losses, but there’s no way ownership does that.
I don’t think Curry would want to be traded and he’s earned the right to make that decision. I could see him wanting to finish his career in the Bay and play for one team like Duncan and Kobe. He has 2 MVPs, 4 championships and is a first ballot Hall of Famer so he has nothing left to prove on the court. His family is rooted to the area, he’s loved by the fans and he’s the highest paid player in the league. Why would he want to leave?
Not saying they should break it down. But if they start trading everyone away and removing currys xhances to get another ring, they should trade himnto the Lakers. He can stay in California and the pairing with Lebron is cool.
Franchise value and attendance would obviously go down, but that will happen in a few years in any case.
there is 0 chance he goes to the Lakers unless they send AD to the warriors. Lakers do not have any assets to trade for Curry.
8 teams get Grade A in my book this season
4 Conference Finals
Top-4 lottery teams
4 Teams get Grade F
76ers
Suns
Warriors
Wolves
Who are the four Conf finals teams going to be? Who are you giving A’s to right now?
If you’re going by the end of the season, you’re not saying anything here. We can all see who was successful and who wasn’t.
Until Brandin Podziemski improves on his 29.5% shooting from behind the three-point arc ….. There is no need to consider him a building block for the future. Guards who cannot make three’s cannot be successful in todays NBA.
Podz doesn’t worry me but Moody does. Last 2 games he looked like a G leaguer going against a bad team. Moody drives to the basket and keeps getting blocked. How about learning to fake a shot into a foul.
Moody getting used in the worst lineups possible is making him look even worse than he’s playing right now. He’s young though, he does well when he plays the 2, but Kerr always puts him at the 3, because small ball is always a disaster now.
Moody playing in the worst lineups? That’s a poor excuse in my opinion.
You can’t say that he’s not getting run, and then say when he is, he’s not out there with the right guys.
Playing time is playing time and you make the most of it or you don’t.
If you’re thrown out with the scrubs, and you’re NOT a scrub yourself, you should shine. You should dominate.
If you’re a good player and you’re thrown out there with the standard second unit or the starters, you should fit in and play well unless you’re a scrub yourself.
This season top-4 best 3 point shooters by volumn
Lavine
Powell
Cam Johnson
Garland
Big Man shoot 3
Towns
Vucevic
Edwards makes 163 3 pointers
Curry makes 135 3 pointers
Anthony Edwards has been coached into shooting more threes by an analytical guy who studied his game.
Golden State I talked to you directly 2 years ago about where you were headed if you did not make the moves to jump into the future of today.
You are now a wilted chefs salad of that talk after winning the championship.
I will address this more in my upcoming review talk with all in my other fourm.
I’ll take this upon myself since I’m very vocal about the Warriors. Could be anybody but I’ll take the baton because I argued for trying to stay on top instead of rebuilding with youth two years ago.
Yes they are a wilted chef salad right now. No doubt about it.
OK so let’s fix it. You don’t drown by falling in the water. You drown by staying there.
So since they are a wilted salad with week old dressing, start the rebuild. Everyone’s available outside of Steph Curry. Everyone.
I dont disagree but I would like to see GSW force Kerr to use twin towers lineups. I want them to acquire Vooch AND Jonas Val AND keep Looney and TJD and just always have 2 of those 4 on court at all times. Even using 3 of them along with Draymond and Steph would be a treat. Sick of this small ball crud that Kerr always defaults to.
Umm…The Warriors did start a rebuild. Why do you think the drafted Wiseman, Kuminga and Moody? They stated this when Klay went down for the 2nd time. Why do you think they brought in Dejan Milojevic? But Covid, knee injury, and a championship thwarted their plans. They were kinda stuck.
That was called their bridge to the future but when they traded Wiseman and Poole they admitted they were taking a step back on a rebuild.
Yes, true giant74. A lot of things happened with the two tiered plan. that caused the failure of it. Oh well, it looked good on paper.
Gary , EVERY TOP NBA TEAM IS CURRENTLY BUILT ON YOUTH. SEE THE DATA, BELOW. The cardinal rule: don’t trade away young talent; instead, get more of it.
With the new CBA, It’s virtually impossible to build a team around players in their 30’s because, one, their contracts have, relatively, lower value per dollar and, two, they miss too many games. Young players are a better value, enabling more talent to be signed, and thereby a superior roster.
1. Here are the 5 top players from the 8 best teams In the league. NOT ONE OF THEM IS OVER 30 YRS OLD
OKC, Denver, Houston, Memphis, Boston, Cleveland, Knicks, Orlando
OKC: SGA, Williams, Dort, Holmgren, Hartenstein
DEN: Jokic, Murray, Gordon, Braun, Porter
HOU: Green, Van Vleet, Sengun, Smith, Brooks
MEM: Morant, Bane, Jackson, Edey, Smart
CLE: Mitchell, Garland, Mobley, Allen, Strus
NYK: Brunson, Bridges, Anunoby, Towns, Hart
ORL: Suggs, Banchero, Wagner, Carter, Isaac
BOS: Tatum, Brown, Porzingis, White, Pritchard
2. 6 teams in decline with key players over 30:
GSW: Curry, Green, Schroder, Hield, SloMo, Payton…
LAC: Leonard, Harden, Powell, Batum
LAL: LeBron, AD, FInney-Smith
MIL: Lillard, Middleton, Lopez, Giannis (30)…
PHI: George, Embiid (30), Drummond, Gordon, Lowry
PHO: Durant, Beal, ONeal
3. 3 young teams with no top 5 players under 30, all teams with better futures than GSW
DET: Cunningham, Ivey, Duren, Stewart, Thompson,
IND: Haliburton, Mathurin, Nebhard, Turner, Siakkam
SAC: Fox, Sabonis, Murray, Monk, Sabonis
CONCLUSION: There is no path to success involving trading away young players and/or acquiring old players. Blame it on the new CBA.
Ari, Of all those top teams that have had these young guys developing I see only two championships over eight teams in the last 10 years.
Conclusion: It has to be a mix of veterans and young guys.
Or you wait for the young guys to develop and then they become too expensive and you have to let them go. See James Harden with OKC. See Al Horford leaving the Celtics for the Sixers.
If your theory was true OKC could’ve won several championships with Durant, Westbrook, Harden, Steven Adams. These young rosters are not sustainable because they want to get paid before they win at all.
Your example of Boston and their incredible youth building program has one championship. Your example of Denver and their homegrown youth has one championship.
You can’t build championship teams solely with youth because they become too expensive and you must let guys go before you win at all.
The way to do it is become a destination like the Warriors were. Veterans come on minimum contracts to win a ring and join the youth. 4 young guys homegrown guys, a couple of scrubs or recent draftees at the end of the bench, then 4 very low paid veteran regulars. That’s how it’s done.
Agree Gary good post , be prepared to be hit with a home and gardens article tho that disproves your entire existence in 3….2….1…..
Aristotle’s post is great until he said the Kings had a better future than the Warriors. They have no defense at all and are about to lose Fox and Sabonis.
The Kings have crested and are coming back down. Real success is very difficult to sustain. They were the number three seed in the west and that’s not too shabby.
If they play this right, they can stay competitive, but if they don’t, they’ll crash. Same with the Warriors.
Gary, those are good insights on the past, but keep in mind I’m talking about the new CBA which started, kicking in only 3 years ago. What I’m describing and what we’re seeing with the top 8 teams is exactly what the CBA intends: competitive balance and reduced player movement.
The new CBA:
– makes it easier for teams to keep drafted players (offering longer, more generous extensions.
– makes it more difficult to acquire quality players later in their career
– has a set pricing schedule that, from a team’s PoV, makes 5 year rookie extensions a better value than the max deals to older veteran players. That enables teams with younger talent to have more total talent
With respect to your OKC example, yes, under the new CBA, they would have had a much better shot at retaining Harden than under the old CBA.
Yes, I agree, the goal of the new CBA was as you say, “competitive balance and reduced player movement.”
They want one max guy per team, perhaps two, then one or two high paid guys and then the rest on minimums. They’re trying to make it a lot easier to keep the homegrown players and secondly, prevent super teams from getting together.
Funny. On one of the Orlando Magic’s fan sites, there is an article stating that trading Vucevic was the best thing the team did.
Hey Stevie Wonder….trading Wiggins for vuch isn’t mortgaging your future and helps the present day. The warriors staff and fans are too emotionally attached. Would also save you a little money. I doubt anyone is giving a 1st for vuch and I’m sure Chicago who need to start losing can flip wiggins in the off season.
Chicago would need to add payroll for the trade to go through unless they have cap space. The other thing is does Chicago want Wiggins? I read they want to sign Giddey so maybe they want expiring payroll so they can resign Giddey.
Who is emotionally attached? Adding a key piece to your offense in the middle of the season may not be the best move. Wiggins might be able to fetch more in the off season. And, they won’t be stuck with an aging Center.
Vucevic is a great fit in GS. But you can’t overpay for him. I see Warriors, Lakers, Kings, Grizzlies as teams who should do something.
PHX: Jimmy Buckets and a conditional 1st from MIA AND GSW
GSW: Kevin Durant and Alec Burks
MIA: Andrew Wiggins, Dennis Schröder, Buddy Hield, and a pair of 2nds from PHX
MAKE THIS HAPPEN, ALL PARTIES INVOLVED!! OHHH-ho MAAAAAAANNNN!!
If there was any possibility that KD could be made a part of a Butler trade (there isn’t), then MIA would have explored it for the purpose of acquiring KD themselves. Of course, KD’s market value is apparently still quite high, and Butler’s is situational, so it would never happen.
Phoenix isn’t going anywhere with KD; Golden State isn’t going anywhere with Wiggins, Schröder and Hield; Miami is now a catastrophe with Jimmy Buckets in tow. You move all these pieces to the places I specified; and POOF(!): ALL 3 become INSTANT tough outs in the playoffs despite unrealistic 2025 title chances. It’s the 2026 season though where we REALLY get to witness the profound effects of this monster deal for all 3 franchises. Buckets would play with an entire SHIPMENT of potato chips on his shoulders – averaging such an enticing 15-8-9 stat line for Suns fans, as Booker and Beal would EASILY eclipse the combined 44ppg stat line for Suns fans. Meanwhile, KD likely wouldn’t salvage this Dubs season, but 2026 would be a CARNAGE-fest of carefree hooping at its best – KD averaging a calm and collected 23ppg, Kuminga right behind him at 22.1, and Steph rounding out the 20s performers at 20.3. And finally, Wiggins would become arguably one of the best complementary fits to Adebayo and Herro’s games. The Heat would be known more now for their explosive offensive production than their tenacious defensive prowess. From Day 1 all the way through mid-April 2026, Miami would know NO WORSE than the #3 spot in the East. Phoenix, GS, and Miami would combine for AT LEAST 171 wins in the 2025-26 season if this trade idea of mine were to become a reality either by 2/6/25 or sometime in July.
A win-win-win for all 3 teams involved, with a tad more urgency to go-for-it-all in the 2026 season for GS and Phoenix.
Chosen Dud, Very compelling I must say. I like your angle. And you know what, watch something like this happen in the next two weeks. I wouldn’t be surprised, even though it would take a monumental act of grand proportions to swing it.
Podz is a long term project who doesn’t fit here. He MUST be traded. He might be a decentish PG in 3-5 years, but GSW does not have the time OR the head coach who knows how to develop players for him.
Moody keeps getting played as a 3 – he is awful at that, he (and Lindy) are STRICT 2’s, neither of them can defend at 3, they get cooked every time and it effects their shooting. Moody has never been allowed the long term starting roles that Podz has gotten before, he has never gotten a chance. We need to see 10 games of him starting ONLY at the 2/SG, playing with Dray at 4, Wiggins at the 3 and Steph at the 1. This lineup will cook, but Kerr almost never uses it.
Vooch is really all this team needs and he’s in their price range. Getting Vooch and Jonas Val would save this season and definitely make this team a contender again, but Kerr these days flat out refuses to use bigs in basketball, you know, the tall guy sport. Toronto just beat GSW because Kerr the idiot refuses to play Looney and TJD together at the same time, even though Poetl and Boucher were out there together, absolutely cooking the small ball lineup, with Dennis, Steph and Buddy out there getting cooked by bigs. Its just a joke at this point: all you gotta do to beat Kerr is play 2-3 bigs at the same time, he responds by going small, and you get unlimited buckets. Kerr has been going out of his way to get fired the last 3 years, its long been time for the Dubs to move on from this washed up clown who thinks playing shorter players in the tall guy sport is smart and good, and it never works, and he has no other plans, because he is incompetent at his job.
The Raptors could play twin towers because Chris Boucher shoots the three. He can play power forward. Looney cannot. He’s a slug and Jackson Davis cannot. He has no perimeter skills at all. He’s young. He might get them but right now he has none.
Davey I think you might complain no matter what happens as long as the Warriors don’t win the championship. If they fire Kerr and bring in a new coach it’ll be the wrong hire.
As fans we just have to roll with what they decide. They can’t read all this stuff we are writing nor do they care to.
We can argue amongst ourselves about what’s right and what isn’t and I guess that’s part of the entertainment of the NBA.
As far as Moody, he’s been given a gazillion quadrillion chances. I’m sure he’s run out there with the starters in practice a lot and he’s been given starting chances in games with the top guys many times.
In my opinion, I think you are ridiculous when you say he needs to be given a 10 game set starting at shooting guard in real game situations when he hasn’t proven himself. That’s just not how it works. It just isn’t.
Real games are not experiments.
Perhaps in the beginning of the year you play 12 guys because you have seven new faces and you need to figure out who plays well together, but you’re not going to give a guy who can’t guard 3’s and sure can’t guard 2’s a 10 game audition in the middle of January.
Quick side note on Looney. I say he’s a slug, but I love him.
He’s been our center for championships and he’s done everything asked and at a low salary. Unsung hero, who deserves a ton of credit in my opinion.
Management told him he was a slug and in today’s game, he needed to become quicker or else he would fade into oblivion as a dinosaur.
So what happened? He did exactly as they suggested. He lost weight, became quicker, worked on his mid range shot, total Kevon Looney professionalism. Love the guy. Glad they haven’t traded him away yet because I think he’s a tremendous asset.