Golden State Warriors Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Warriors Notes: Thompson, Poole, Lineups, Wiseman

March 13th, 2022 at 8:58am CST by Arthur Hill

After two weeks of struggling with his shot, Klay Thompson unleashed the type of game the Warriors will need to make a long playoff run, writes Kendra Andrews of ESPN. Thompson scored 38 points on Saturday night, his highest total since returning from a long injury absence, with eight three-pointers, six rebounds and five assists in a win over Milwaukee.

“Everybody makes a big deal about my shooting, man,” said Thompson, who connected on 15 of his 24 shots from the field. “I mean, I’m not happy with how I was shooting but I know these nights are within me. I just know. I’ve done too many great things that players haven’t done before to doubt myself.”

However, there were some outside doubters as questions started to emerge about Thompson’s effectiveness after missing more than two full seasons with two serious injuries. He was mired in a slump after the All-Star break, shooting just 34% from the floor and 23.3% from beyond the arc over his last four games. He has also been in and out of the lineup, missing two games because of illness and two others while being rested in back-to-backs.

“He’s so hard on himself and wants so badly to succeed,” coach Steve Kerr said. “I thought he just let the game come to him early. He didn’t hunt shots. Over the past few games, he’s been taking tough ones early, which has kept him from getting into a rhythm. Tonight, it felt like he was taking better shots early. … You know Klay, once a couple go in, the tougher ones get a lot easier for him.”

There’s more on the Warriors:

Kerr tried a different starting lineup Saturday, using reserve guard Jordan Poole along with Thompson and Stephen Curry, notes Anthony Slater of The Athletic. The change was partially dictated by the matchup — Kerr wanted another play-maker on the court with Jrue Holiday guarding Curry — but the trio has been especially productive, posting a plus-97 in the 104 minutes they’ve played together.
Kerr only used eight players against the Bucks, but he will soon have a lot more options, Slater adds. Draymond Green is expected to return Monday, along with Otto Porter, and Andre Iguodala and Gary Payton II are both on the way back. “What’s becoming apparent to me, this year, is that we could have a different starting lineup from game to game in the playoffs, series to series,” Kerr said. “This is not the Warriors from five years ago when you knew exactly what was coming. We got a lot of really good pieces, but we have some new ones, some unproven ones. We have to be able to adjust quickly on the fly if things aren’t going well.”
Kerr was “thrilled” about James Wiseman‘s performance in his first G League game and said he should be ready for NBA action “soon,” according to Dalton Johnson of NBC Sports Bay Area. Wiseman will play for Santa Cruz again today, and Kerr and a few players plan to attend.

Warriors Notes: Wiseman, Poole, Wiggins, Thompson

March 11th, 2022 at 4:03pm CST by Luke Adams

Warriors center James Wiseman returned to the court on Thursday for the first time in 11 months, playing for the Santa Cruz Warriors in the G League after recovering from a pair of procedures on his knee. As Anthony Slater of The Athletic writes, Wiseman had to shake off some rust, but had a productive outing, scoring 18 points and grabbing six rebounds in just 21 minutes.

According to Slater, the plan is for Wiseman to review film of the game on Friday, practice with Santa Cruz on Saturday, and play in another G League contest on Sunday. After that, Golden State will determine whether or not he’s ready to make his NBA return.

Here’s more on the Warriors:

Jordan Poole‘s dagger three-pointers in the final minute of the Warriors’ Thursday win over Denver was the latest example of the 22-year-old’s ability to rise to big moments, according to Marcus Thompson II of The Athletic, who says Poole’s regular season performance bodes well for his odds of playing an important role in the team’s playoff run.
Conversely, Andrew Wiggins‘ game has taken a “taken a precipitous decline” as of late, writes Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area. Wiggins has made just 34.6% of his free throw attempts since January, prompting Poole to wonder whether the All-Star forward can still be a regular part of crunch-time lineups this spring if he doesn’t turn things around soon.
Klay Thompson‘s shooting numbers this season – including 34.5% from the floor and 28.8% on threes in his last seven games – remain well below his career rates. But head coach Steve Kerr isn’t worried about the veteran sharpshooter, who is still working his way back into top form following a two-and-a-half year absence due to ACL and Achilles tears. “The only thing that I’m stressing with Klay right now is to just get great shots,” Kerr said on Thursday, per Josh Schrock of NBC Sports Bay Area. “If he’s not open, to move it on. I think we’ve really tried to give Klay a lot of freedom in his comeback, just to be able to feel the game. Not to harp on mistakes and that sort of thing. But the bottom line is we are at our best when the ball moves, and we’re getting good shots.”

Slater Considers How Warriors Could Use Wiseman

March 10th, 2022 at 10:04am CST by Luke Adams

With James Wiseman nearing a return, Anthony Slater of The Athletic explores how the Warriors might use him down the stretch, especially when they’re trying to build momentum for the postseason and also reintegrate Draymond Green. In Slater’s view, dedicating a few minutes per half to a second unit led by a Jordan Poole/Wiseman pick-and-roll game could make sense for Golden State.

Tyreke Evans Working Out For Warriors

March 8th, 2022 at 10:51pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

Free agent wing Tyreke Evans is set to work out with the Warriors this week, per Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).

Anthony Slater of The Athletic adds (Twitter link) that Golden State first worked out Evans last week in Miami, where he has been training with free agent forward Michael Beasley and shelved Rockets point guard John Wall. Slater concludes that Evans’ performance must have merited a second look.

Last week, Evans worked out for the Bucks, who are fairly thin on the wing due to injuries and a deadline trade. The fit for Evans on Golden State seems less definitive, especially since the Warriors don’t have an open roster spot like Milwaukee, but he would add some size and versatility across all three perimeter positions and is a capable passer.

Evans, the 2010 Rookie of the Year, boasts a decade of league experience from 2009-19. Last month, Evans was reinstated into the NBA after being suspended by the league since 2019 for violating its drug policy. The 32-year-old guard has not played elsewhere since his ban.

Over the course of his NBA career thus far, Evans has suited up for the Kings, Pelicans, Grizzlies and most recently the Pacers. In 594 games, the 6’6″ vet out of Memphis holds averages of 15.7 PPG, 4.8 APG, 4.6 RPG and 1.2 SPG on .440/.323/.757 shooting splits. During his lone season in Indiana, he saw his role reduced. In just 20.3 MPG, Evans averaged 10.2 PPG on 38.9% shooting from the field.

Warriors Notes: Wiseman, Center Rotation, Moody, Kirk Lacob

March 8th, 2022 at 8:30pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

Second-year Warriors center James Wiseman is scheduled to play in two games for Golden State’s G League affiliate, the Santa Cruz Warriors, this week, per a team press release. Wiseman has recovered enough from a pair of procedures on his knee to be cleared to play in a game situation.

According to Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area (Twitter link), while there’s still no official target date for Wiseman’s NBA return “whispers” indicate it could happen during an upcoming home stand at the Chase Center, from March 12-20. Sources tell Kendra Andrews of ESPN that Wiseman is “highly unlikely” to become a permanent part of Golden State’s playoff-bound rotation, but he is projected to earn occasional spot minutes.

The seven-footer, still just 20, was selected with the No. 2 pick out of Memphis in the 2020 draft. In his 39 healthy NBA games to this point, he has averaged 11.5 PPG and 5.8 RPG. His lack of experience will likely preclude him from being more than the Warriors’ third center this year.

There’s more out of the Chase Center:

Though the Warriors could benefit from an additional reserve center behind starter Kevon Looney, the team appears to have prioritized wings as it makes a postseason push, writes Tim Kawakami of The Athletic. Kawakami notes that 6’7″ starting power forward Draymond Green remains the club’s most effective center as a small-ball option, adding that Wiseman could work as a backup big in certain situations.
Warriors head coach Steve Kerr has identified rookie wing Moses Moody as a key piece for Golden State moving forward, per Michael Scotto of HoopsHype (Twitter link). “He’s a keeper,” Kerr raved after Moody scored a career-high 30 points in Denver on Monday.. “He’s a guy who’s going to be a cornerstone for this team for a long time to come. It’s easy to see that right now in his rookie year.”
As part of his NBA 40 Under 40 series, Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic interviews Warriors executive vice president of basketball operations Kirk Lacob, noting that the son of team majority owner Joe Lacob, has become a trusted voice for team president Bob Myers. The younger Lacob discussed how the team handles player development with a new youth-heavy roster. “We’ve got someone on the coaching staff who is solely kind of dedicated as the director of player development and their job is to make sure players have development courses at every part of their career, and that the coaching staff is on the same kind of alignment as the performance team because that’s a whole other player element is your physical performance,” he said. “On the front office side, we’ve got a whole group and we call them team development, but part of team development is player development.”

Draymond Green Targeting March 14 Return

March 7th, 2022 at 10:57pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Warriors forward Draymond Green expects to return next Monday, March 14 against Washington, he said on his podcast (video link; hat tip to Marc Stein).

“That is the day I’m targeting,” Green said. “It’s been almost two-and-a-half months. I’ve never missed that much time during a season. … This is something different for me. I’m excited to get back out there with my guys to try to help right the ship.”

Green has been sidelined since early January due to a back injury. Golden State could certainly use the boost. The team has lost five straight and nine of its last 11 games.

The Warriors have three more games before Green’s target date — home games against the Clippers on Tuesday and the Bucks on Saturday sandwiching a road stop in Denver on Thursday.

The Warriors were 29-7 before Green was forced to the sidelines. He was averaging 7.9 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 7.4 APG, 1.4 SPG and 1.2 BPG in 34 games.

Green’s defensive presence has been sorely missed, especially in recent games. The Warriors have allowed 122 or more points in their last four contests.

Warriors Notes: Curry, Thompson, Veterans, Make-Up Game

March 6th, 2022 at 8:56am CST by Arthur Hill

The season is unraveling for the Warriors at a really bad time, writes Kendra Andrews of ESPN. Golden State fell to the Lakers Saturday night, extending its losing streak to four games for the first time this season. The team has fallen into third place in the Western Conference after going 2-8 in its last 10 games, and Stephen Curry understands that something needs to change.

“We cannot give in to this losing mentality,” he said. “We’re not that team, and I’m not going to let us be that team. … We cannot give in to this losing spirit of just finding different ways to lose basketball games. We have 18 games left, we have to figure out how to turn things around pretty quick.”

The Warriors are dealing with a variety of issue, with the most notable being the absence of Draymond Green, who hasn’t played since January 9 but hopes to be back in “a couple weeks.” However, the problems go beyond Green, Andrews adds, as Golden State has been struggling with missed free throws, a drop in bench production and executing late in games, which coach Steve Kerr blamed for Saturday’s loss.

“I thought we had several chances to really break this game open,” Kerr said. “This has kind of been a pattern during this bad spell for us. We are not stepping on teams when they are down. We are making mistakes and allowing teams to hang around. And when you do that in this league, you’re dead.”

There’s more on the Warriors:

Another concern is a shooting slump by Klay Thompson, who is going through his worst stretch since returning from a long injury-related layoff, per Anthony Slater of The Athletic. Thompson was just 3-of-13 Saturday night, including an important miss on a wide open three in the final two minutes. “Klay’s pressing,” Kerr said. “He got into a pretty good groove over the month or so before the All-Star break, and I feel like the sickness, the illness that kept him out of a couple of games probably affected his conditioning and his timing. So, he struggled the last two games. He’ll get it back.”
The Warriors are getting quality minutes from their young players, but many of the veterans they signed during the offseason aren’t producing right now, Slater adds. Andre Iguodala has only played one six-minute stretch since January 20, Nemanja Bjelica is losing his spot in the rotation and Otto Porter Jr. hasn’t been the same since January ended.
Kerr expressed frustration over the league’s decision to schedule a make-up game Monday at Denver and said he won’t have Curry, Thompson, Andrew Wiggins and possibly a few other players make the trip, according to Dalton Johnson of NBC Sports Bay Area. “We are not sending a lot of our players to Denver,” Kerr said. “The decision was pretty easy. Throwing that game (originally scheduled for December 30) into the schedule the way the league did after that game was postponed and then going back to Denver — three games in four nights, with two of those games being back and forth, we’re not gonna put our high-minutes guys at risk.”

Warriors Notes: Green, Offense, Wiseman, Moody

March 4th, 2022 at 10:38am CST by Luke Adams

Asked by Anthony Slater of The Athletic after Thursday’s loss to Dallas about when he thinks he’ll return to action, Warriors forward Draymond Green said he’s aiming to be back in “a couple weeks.”

Green stated during the All-Star Game in Cleveland last month that he hoped to return within three or four weeks. That was 12 days ago, so it appears his recovery timeline hasn’t changed since then.

As we relayed earlier this week, Green has started doing 3-on-3 work, so 4-on-4 and 5-on-5 reps will likely follow. According to Slater, the next couple weeks may be more about Green getting his conditioning and rhythm back than anything else, since he wasn’t able to run or do much cardio work while he was resting his back injury.

Here’s more on the Warriors:

In an in-depth story for ESPN.com, Kendra Andrews examines what Green means to the Warriors not just on defense, but on offense. Prior to his injury, Green ranked second on the team in touches per game (73.6) and first in assists (7.4). Head coach Steve Kerr believes Green’s absence has had an impact on players like Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole, who benefit from his play-making. “Understand that, especially without Draymond for this extended stretch, our offense is a little different,” Stephen Curry said. “There is a lot more responsibility in terms of play-making, being on the ball and handling that attention.”
One Warriors coach told Andrews that James Wiseman is highly unlikely to be a big part of the Warriors’ regular rotation this season, especially in the playoffs. Golden State believes the young center can help in certain situations, but is more focused on what he can do for the team in future seasons, which Kerr hinted at when he discussed Wiseman’s status on Thursday. “This guy needs reps. He needs a thousand reps,” Kerr said (Twitter link via Slater). “He needs a Summer League, he needs a training camp. So let’s temper the expectations, but be excited about his future, because as he gets those reps, he’s got the potential to be a tremendous player.”
Kerr said after Thursday’s game that he expects rookie Moses Moody to continue getting rotation minutes going forward, according to Slater. Moody’s playing time has been inconsistent this year, but he has appeared in 11 of the Warriors’ last 13 games, starting five of them, and has acquitted himself well. On Thursday, he scored 13 fourth-quarter points on 5-of-5 shooting.

Projected NBA Taxpayers For 2021/22

March 4th, 2022 at 9:27am CST by Luke Adams

The 2021/22 NBA season will be a record-setting one for luxury tax payments.

According to data from Albert Nahmad of HeatHoops.com and Yossi Gozlan of HoopsHype, the league’s previous single-year record for total luxury tax payments was $173.3MM, back in 2002/03.

This season, the Warriors‘ tax penalties alone will nearly match that league-wide record. And they’ll be joined by six other projected taxpayers whose combined end-of-season bills would eclipse the previous record even without Golden State’s help.

In the space below, we’ve done our best to ballpark the current tax bill for each of this season’s seven projected taxpayers. These numbers may end up looking slightly different after the season, since it can be tricky to pin down the precise amount of a tax bill during the season.

Earned and unearned incentives in certain players’ contracts can affect eventual tax payments, and not all of the criteria for those incentives are public. Even the incentives that are known may not have been decided yet — for instance, Nets guard Kyrie Irving will earn a $137,500 bonus if he makes at least 88.5% of his free throws this season. He’s currently at 91.9%, but has only had 62 attempts, so it remains possible his free throw rate will dip below 88.5%, costing him that bonus and reducing Brooklyn’s tax bill.

Additionally, even after the trade deadline, a team’s tax bill remains fluid due to possible forthcoming roster moves, suspensions, and a handful of other factors. The Sixers‘ projected tax bill just increased last night when they officially signed DeAndre Jordan to a rest-of-season contract.

With all that in mind, here are the current projected penalties for this season’s probable taxpayers, based on our math, along with salary data from Spotrac and Basketball Insiders:

Golden State Warriors: $170.3MM
Brooklyn Nets: $97.0MM
Los Angeles Clippers: $82.5MM
Milwaukee Bucks: $56.5MM
Los Angeles Lakers: $45.0MM
Utah Jazz: $18.8MM
Philadelphia 76ers: $13.9MM

In total, these seven teams project to owe a staggering $484MM in luxury tax payments.

Half of that total will be dispersed to the league’s non-taxpayers, which means that 23 teams should be in line to split a pot of about $242MM. That would work out to a payment of approximately $10.5MM for each of those 23 non-taxpayers.

These numbers make it more obvious why a team like the Celtics made a concerted effort to get out of luxury tax territory at the trade deadline. A tax bill of $2MM or so wouldn’t break the bank for Boston’s ownership group, but the C’s generated more than just $2MM in savings by ducking below the tax line — they’re now in line to be one of those 23 teams that receives a $10MM+ windfall.

It’s worth noting too that the Warriors are the only one of these seven projected taxpayers who will be subjected to “repeater” penalties this season, so it’s not as if those more punitive repeater penalties are fueling this year’s record-setting totals. Even without the repeater penalties, the Dubs would still owe approximately $131.1MM in taxes.

Andre Iguodala Nearing Return

March 4th, 2022 at 7:18am CST by Luke Adams

Warriors swingman Andre Iguodala (back), who has played just once since January 20, is “making strides,” according to head coach Steve Kerr (Twitter link via Josh Schrock of NBC Sports Bay Area). The team still wants to have Iguodala participate in more scrimmages before he’s cleared to return, so he’s considered day-to-day for now.