Warriors Should Trade Stephen Curry, Look Towards Future

This will not be a popular discussion for the Golden State Warriors faithful. However, it is tough to ignore how badly the Warriors are failing Stephen Curry right now.

The team missed the NBA Playoffs last season after getting torched in the NBA Play-In Tournament by the Sacramento Kings , losing 118-94. Curry and the Warriors simply could not keep up with the young and hungry Kings.

After retaining Draymond Green in the previous offseason, the team finally saw the original band break up this year. Klay Thompson chose to move on from the Warriors, joining the Dallas Mavericks via sign-and-trade. In a way, this move here signaled the beginning of the end.

Thompson is far removed from his best days, but it was still jarring to see someone whom many believed would be a Warrior for life leave the team. The team attempted to retool, pursuing a Paul George sign-and-trade, but it never materialized due to the L.A. Clippers playing hard-ball with their division rival.

The team remains in on attempting to improve the roster for next season. They are one of the teams connected to a potential Lauri Markkanen trade with the Utah Jazz . If they fail in their endeavor, it is hard to envision the Warriors competing for anything of note in the upcoming 2024-25 season.

Even if they were to land Markkanen, it still remains questionable whether that truly elevates them into the same tier as the Western Conference’s best teams. It may be tough to accept, but it appears that the Warriors’ window to contend is all but shut. It may be time to consider building towards the future and that could mean trading Curry in the process.

Old Man Curry

Greatest shooter of all time is creeping towards the end of his playing days

Curry will be 36 years old to start the upcoming season. Father time will surely have his eyes set on LeBron James as his main target out of the NBA legends still in the game over the next few seasons, but Curry will not be far behind on that list. Believe it or not, Curry is a lot closer to the top of the list of oldest active players in the league than one would like to admit.

This is not an indictment on Curry’s game. He continues to perform at a superstar level in the league, even in his 15th season. However, Curry does not appear to be quite at that level where he can drag this dying corpse of a dynasty to NBA relevancy.

The Warriors finished 10th in the Western Conference last season with a record of 46-36. Their path in the Western Conference will not get any easier in the upcoming seasons. Curry may still be an elite player, but he is in danger of following the Kobe Bryant path into retirement, where his team takes a cliff dive into NBA mediocrity or worse.

Loaded Western Conference

Challenge of competing out West is not getting any easier in the upcoming season

If the Warriors struggled to compete last year, they are certainly not going to find it fun navigating through the bloodbath that the conference projects to be next year. It feels as though all but two teams in the West will enter the 2024-25 campaign with some playoff aspirations.

The landscape of the conference does not favor the fading dynasty of the Warriors. The team did make a few moves in free agency that are worthy of mentioning, adding Buddy Hield , De’Anthony Melton , and Kyle Anderson .

Hield, Melton, and Anderson are good players and should fit well into the Warriors system and play style. However, given where the team was last year, it is highly unlikely that they will elevate the Warriors to where they would ideally like to be.

The major question that still needs to be addressed is the co-star for Curry. There may be some excitement about Jonathan Kuminga and how his growth could help the team, but as far as any championship run goes, it would be hard to confidently stack this team up against any of the conference’s best.

The Minnesota Timberwolves , Oklahoma City Thunder , and Mavericks have all improved this offseason, widening the gap between them and the Warriors. Teams like the Clippers and Denver Nuggets may have regressed, but was it enough for the Warriors to feel confident as competitors against either of them?

The Phoenix Suns , New Orleans Pelicans , and Kings have all retooled and added pieces after already being ahead of the Warriors. The L.A. Lakers will hope that a coaching change improves upon last season’s good but not great campaign.

Then there’s a team like the Memphis Grizzlies , who have been a regular fixture in the playoffs and will be looking to reestablish themselves after an injury-riddled campaign. Young and hungry teams like the Houston Rockets and San Antonio Spurs will also be looking to take the next step with their young cores.

It is hard to picture the Warriors, as currently constructed, beating out five of those teams to secure a playoff spot. It is even harder to picture them truly packing a punch in a playoff series against the elites of the Western Conference.

Value Of Curry

Warriors could set themselves up for the future with a potential trade haul

It is hard to see the path to putting a title team around Curry. If that is not the goal of this organization, then what is? Are they content with treading water until Curry retires?

The Warriors are not afforded the luxury of time in many capacities. The contenders in the conference will not be aging out any time soon, and the Warriors’ superstar will be.

The Warriors have a small handful of promising young players, but life after Curry looks bleaker than the organization would likely be willing to admit.

It feels weird to imagine Curry in another team’s jersey, but there should still be teams around the league willing to fork over a considerable amount of their future to add a player of his caliber. It may not be pretty, but for the Warriors, the undesirable path may be the right one in the long run.

Stats are courtesy of Basketball Reference.

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