While it’s been obvious for a while where this was headed, it became official on Wednesday: Lauri Markkanen signed a contract extension with the Jazz and is unavailable for a trade until next offseason.
Now where do the Warriors turn to get another shot-creator next to Stephen Curry?
While they are poking around looking at smaller moves, Golden State is not pivoting to the other big available names of the Pelcians’ Brandon Ingram or the Bulls’ Zach LaVine, reports Shams Charania, Tony Jones and Anthony Slater at The Athletic.
The Warriors have 14 players under contract for next season and feel comfortable entering training camp and the regular season as currently constructed, team sources said, though they are expected to explore smaller-scale deals more actively than is typical in August and September... They’ve shown no appetite to enter the Zach LaVine or Brandon Ingram market.
Two quick thoughts here.
LaVine and Ingram are All-Star level players and bucket-getters, but they are the poster children for how the new Collective Bargaining Agreement has got teams rethinking how they build rosters. LaVine is owed $138 million over the next three seasons ($46 million a season average) and Ingram has one year left on his contract at $36 million but wants a max contract extension after that. In a world where the new CBA, in practice, allows teams to have two max or near max players if they want depth on the roster, front offices are stepping back and asking who they want to give those massive deals to. While Ingram and LaVine are elite scorers who make teams better, front offices are questioning whether they are the kinds of players who should get that max money. Do they contribute enough all around to a winning team?
Second, the Warriors may have lost big names in Klay Thompson and Chris Paul this summer, but they had a good offseason. In the place of those Hall of Famers closer to the end of their careers, the Warriors added Buddy Hield, D’Anthony Melton and Kyle Anderson, making the team a little deeper and better balanced than last season. Add those veterans to a youth movement led by Brandin Podzemski, Jonathan Kumimga and Trayce Jackson-Davis and the Warriors have something worth watching. They still need a secondary shot creator to take the pressure off Stephen Curry, but if this is the roster the Warriors enter the season with they will be better than some outside the Bay Area think.
