Getty (From left) Draymond Green, Otto Porter Jr.,, Kevon Looney, Klay Thompson, Andrew Wiggins and Jordan Poole of the Golden State Warriors.
The Golden State Warriors are nearing a crossroads where they will have to make at least one monumental decision between youth and loyalty.
Klay Thompson will be a free agent in two summers. If they aren’t extended, Andrew Wiggins will hit free agency one year from now and Jordan Poole will enter restricted free agency at the same time. Draymond Green can decide to become a free agent in 2023 by opting out of the final year of his deal, otherwise his contract will expire when Thompson’s does.
The general belief is that the Warriors front office will have to say goodbye to at least one of these four core members of the defending championship team. Adding a layer of intrigue, one NBA executive said recently that the solution to this problem isn’t the player most might assume.
“[The Warriors] have tough decisions, and if one of the decisions is that, after this contract is up, they let Klay walk, he should have some choices,” the exec told Sean Deveney of Heavy.com on August 22. “I think, sentimentally, they are going to keep him. But if you are talking about losing Poole or Wiggins or even Draymond in order to keep a 34-year-old Klay Thompson — if you’re making the decision strictly on basketball — you’d have to let Klay go.”
The argument against Thompson is that Wiggins and Poole could replace him by committee. Poole was a breakout offensive player last season, averaging 18.5 points four assists, 3.4 rebounds and 0.8 steals in 30 minutes of playing time per night, according to Basketball Reference. He also shot 36.4% from the 3-point line, a number that demands respect from opposing defenses.
Wiggins is something of a poor man’s Thompson when the latter was at his pinnacle, a two-way player capable of guarding the opponent’s top offensive option and having enough left to contribute meaningfully on the offensive end. Wiggins averaged 17.2 points, 4.5 rebounds, 2.2 assists and one steal in just shy of 32 minutes per outing last season. He also shot well from behind the arc, posting a career-high mark of 39.3%.
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Warriors Have Done Right by Klay Thompson With Current Contract
Getty(From left) Golden State Warriors stars Jordan Poole, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green celebrate a 3-point basket during a game against the Utah Jazz.
The Warriors’ way out of the personnel conundrum is if two or three of the aforementioned players, including Thompson, were willing to take a significant pay cut to remain with Golden State when their time comes.
The executive told Deveney that the prime candidate for such a move may well be Thompson, especially after the five-year, $190 million deal the Dubs afforded him in 2019.
The first thing is, [Thompson] is not going to want to leave there voluntarily. If you ask around the league, I don’t think there are many players who are happier in their situations than Klay Thompson is in the Bay Area, playing for the Warriors.
It’s not like they’ve treated Klay badly. They gave him almost $200 million a couple weeks after he tore his ACL and they knew he would be out for a year. Maybe he’d take a big discount to stay, he is a little off-beat like that. I am not sure getting every penny he can is what drives him.
Klay Thompson Will Have Suitors If Warriors Let Him Walk
GettyLeBron James (left, front) of the Cleveland Cavaliers talks with Klay Thompson (right, front) of the Golden State Warriors.
Finally, the executive noted that Thompson will have several options in free agency in 2024 should the Warriors decide to end the relationship or if he does it himself.
At the top of that list is the Los Angeles Lakers. Thompson could join LeBron James and Anthony Davis in a super-senior version of a superteam, as they would be 34, 39 and 31 years old, respectively.
Another option would the Sacramento Kings, the executive said, which will presumably still be led by new head coach Mike Brown, who served as an assistant to Steve Kerr in Golden State for the last several years. However, the Kings would need to demonstrate the capacity to win in a real way in order to entice Thompson as he nears the end of his career.
The third team the NBA executive mentioned to Deveney as a possible fit for Thompson was the Portland Trail Blazers.