Since a 12-3 start that has proven to be a heaping haul of fool’s gold, the Golden State Warriors have lost two out of every three games over the last two months with a bottom-five offense and bottom-10 defense. They’re always on at least the edges of trade rumors but other than a bargain-bin deal for Dennis Schroder they have yet to pull the trigger on anything extending back to the summer when they were nibbling around Paul George and Lauri Markannen.
The prevailing thought has always been that Stephen Curry remains too great to just give up on another title run. But the way this team has looked this season hasn’t inspired any realistic hope that there is a trade out there that could vault the Warriors into honest contention, and short of that, ownership and the front office is and has clearly been unwilling to compromise what they believe is still a promising future.
This has included, most recently and notably, rumors around a possible Jimmy Butler trade. The Warriors, whether for negotiating purposes or genuine disinterest given Miami’s assumed high asking price, previously made it clear they were not going to get into the Butler business. That was probably smart. Butler, on his own, isn’t going to make Golden State a contender, and he’s going to want a big contract extension this summer that will be a pretty tough pill to swallow for any organization given Butler’s advanced age.
But this is, and always has been, about price, and with a report on Tuesday suggesting Miami is now willing to take less in return just to get the now thrice-suspended Butler the hell away from the team, the Warriors should absolutely be looking to not just reenter Butler mix, but pounce on what could be a golden opportunity to have their cake and eat it, too.
O’Connor indicated that the Warriors are indeed one of “several teams back in the mix” for Butler, but you’ll have to forgive Golden State fans if they’re taking an I’ll-believe-it-when-I-see-it approach. They’ve gotten their hopes up a lot since that 2022 championship. They’ve watched their front office, which may be another way of saying Joe Lacob, tell everyone who will listen that they have no intention of wasting the last years of the greatest player in franchise history’s prime while doing nothing of any significant to back those claims up.
Jonathan Kuminga and, far more perplexing, Brandin Podziemski have been painted as untouchable even as Steve Kerr has never been willing to fully commit to their development. When they’re playing well, they play regular minutes. When they’re not, they don’t. Same goes for Moses Moody. All of this is understandable for a team that’s trying to win now, but if you’re going to play the development card, then play it.
Otherwise, it’s time to go get Butler if the price is right. And by right, I mean reasonable. The Warriors can’t be looking for a rip off and nothing else. They have to be willing to compromise some assets. But if Miami’s ready to listen to offers that, say, include only one of Kuminga or future pick(s), but not both, Golden State better pull the trigger or, once and for all, put an end to the win-now charade and fully admit they are ready to ride off into the Steph sunset.
As for the mechanics of what a reasonable Butler deal could look like, Andrew Wiggins or Draymond Green would have to be in it, plus more, to make the the incoming and outgoing money work. Removing nostalgia, would the Warriors actually be better off trading Green? It’s a fair question.
Also, would Miami want to take on the salaries of Green and/or Wiggins, both of whom have two years after this one remaining (player options in 2026)? Probably not. According to Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald, the Heat are positioning themselves to have more than $80 million in cap space in the summer of 2026, when Luka Doncic — and a host of other notable players — is set, as of now, to be a free agent.
That makes a guy like Julius Randle, whose contract expires this summer, more enticing. And wouldn’t you know it … Ian Begley is reporting that Miami was interested in trading for Randle this offseason before New York sent him the Wolves. That could potentially make a three-team deal between the Warriors, Wolves and Heat a viable option with Wiggins going back to Minnesota and Randle heading to Miami.
Point is, there are a number of ways this could potentially work for the Warriors to end up with Butler. We love to speculate with hypothetical deals in this everyone’s-a-GM age, but in the end, the only thing that really matters is if a team wants to get something done there is almost always a way.
There’s a way for the Warriors to do this. They shouldn’t go overboard for Butler, because alone he’s not enough and then you just have to deal with paying him this summer to justify the heavy price you paid to land him in the first place. But if they can retain core assets either to keep this supposed bridge to the future intact or, even better, to use on a another trade (Nikola Vucevic, anyone?) to further bolster this current roster’s chances of competing for a title, they need to go for it.
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This might be a now-or-never situation, and with Curry still as good as he is, never is too bitter of a pill to swallow if there is even a halfway reasonable way of avoiding it. Butler gives the Warriors the second star they desperate need to create offense outside the old-news system that just doesn’t create shots on its own anymore.
Funny how that works when prime Klay Thompson and Curry aren’t running around with Kevin Durant and Andre Iguodala. If the Warriors are going to compete now, they have to do it like the rest of the league that needs great players creating consistent advantages. From there, all of Golden State’s movement can be a separating characteristic that could make them extremely tough to guard in a postseason series. It’s there for the taking if Miami is offering. We’ll see if the Warriors actually back up their claims and prove they still believe in Stephen Curry.
