Getty Chris Paul
Golden State Warriors owner Joe Lacob revealed they have no plans of trading away Chris Paul after acquiring him in the Jordan Poole trade.
‘There’s a lot of possibilities,” Lacob told The Athletic’s Kim Kawakami. “… But I don’t think our goal, quite frankly, is to trade Chris Paul away or do something with that contract. We like the idea of having Chris Paul on the team. And we’re excited about it. So let’s see what happens, how it works and how successful we are, and we’ll take it from there.”
While Paul is already 38, he was still a serviceable point guard with the Phoenix Suns last season.
Warming up to Chris Paul
Lacob initially hesitated to trade for Paul but warmed up to the idea after looking at the big picture. On top of the financial reasons, Paul’s solid track record of elevating young teams into playoff contention is what convinced the Warriors to go for it when the opportunity to trade for him presented itself.
“Chris Paul, when I first heard that and thought about it, it was, like, really? Seems highly unlikely we would do that,” Lacob said. “But the more we thought about it, the more we considered our options, the more we realized, hey, he’s a great player, always has made other people better. He hasn’t won a championship, maybe he can do that with our group. It would be a helluva storybook ending to his career, or near-ending if he were able to do that with us.”
Paul has already established relationships this summer, linking up with Stephen Curry and working out with Jonathan Kuminga, who declared he’s ready for a breakout year.
Paul in the blue and gold jersey might need a little time to get used to after his fierce rivalry with the team in the playoffs, especially when he was still with the Houston Rockets at the height of the Warriors’ dynasty in the last decade.
“We kind of warmed to that idea and the more we processed it, the more we thought it really made sense — at least for the short-to-intermediate term,” Lacob said. “Certainly longer-term, I’m not going to deny, we gave up a great asset in Jordan Poole, probably has a decade or so left to play in this league. He’s probably going to just get better. We were going short-term versus long-term on this. But for a lot of different reasons, both basketball reasons and financial reasons, it just made sense to do it.”
Warriors’ Flexibility With Chris Paul
According to Lacob, acquiring Paul made a lot of sense for the Warriors for basketball and financial reasons.
Paul gives Warriors coach Steve Kerr more optionality on the court. Off the court, Paul provides new general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. more financial flexibility to continue building around their expensive championship core.
Kerr can use Paul as their Sixth Man to lead their young bench, or play him at the point with Stephen Curry as the two-guard in some matchups. But on the financial side is where Paul can immensely help the Warriors, who will incur above $400 million in payroll (including luxury taxes) next season.
Pauls’ $30 million salary for next season is non-guaranteed, giving Dunleavy Jr. three options on how to approach next season:
- Waive him and open up cap space
- Guarantee-and-trade him for a younger player earning big money
- Bring him back on a much lesser deal.
Everything will depend on how next season pans out for Paul and the Warriors.