Mike Dunleavy on Kuminga trade request: ‘There needs to be a demand on the market’

SAN FRANCISCO — As the Golden State Warriors prepare for life without Jimmy Butler, who will miss the rest of the season with a torn ACL, the key question in the short term is what happens with forward Jonathan Kuminga?

The 23-year-old hadn’t played since Dec. 18 before scoring 20 points in 21 minutes Tuesday against the Toronto Raptors, and there remains frustration between the Warriors’ front office and Kuminga’s camp about his role. ESPN reported last week that Kuminga has demanded a trade, but with Butler out, the Warriors could use Kuminga in his absence.

Before Tuesday’s 145-127 loss, Warriors coach Steve Kerr was noncommittal when asked whether he expected Kuminga to be part of the rotation again.

“He could be, yeah,” Kerr said. “He obviously hasn’t played in a while, but at this point, we have to experiment a little bit with rotations, see where we are, and he’s definitely a part of that talk, that conversation.”

When asked about Kuminga’s recent trade demand, Warriors general manager Mike Dunleavy offered a telling response.

“As far as the demand, I’m aware of that,” Dunleavy said before Tuesday’s game. “In terms of demands, when there’s a demand, there needs to be a demand on the market. So we’ll see how that unfolds.”

Dunleavy, who acknowledged he wasn’t sure exactly how Butler’s injury would affect the Warriors at the trade deadline, was honest in his assessment of the group as he tried to remain positive about whatever the future might hold for his team.

“Let’s call it what it is,” Dunleavy said. “We’re not as good without Jimmy.”

Kerr felt awful that the 36-year-old former All-Star was going to miss the rest of a year in which he really started to help the Warriors find a rhythm.

“Most of all, just disappointed for Jimmy,” Kerr said. “He’s having a great year. I felt, like the last couple weeks, he was really at the top of his game. So, for him, and for us, obviously, but for him individually in the middle of a really great season with a lot of possibilities … I just feel terrible for him that he’s gonna miss the rest of the year. It’s part of the game. Injuries are part of it, but it hurts for sure.”

The Warriors said Butler will have surgery at a date to be determined. He suffered the injury with 7:41 left in the third quarter of Monday night’s win over the Miami Heat. He jumped up to catch a pass from Warriors guard Brandin Podziemski and fell awkwardly on his knee while trying to catch the ball over Heat guard Davion Mitchell.

Kerr said that, though he feels for Butler, he also feels the Warriors are “well equipped with our depth to continue to play at a high level” in his absence. Butler averaged 20 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.9 assists in 38 games this season.

“I think we have enough now to compete,” Kerr said. “I think Al (Horford) and Melt (De’Anthony Melton) have given us a different dynamic. I think a lot of our young players — Quinten, Will Richard, those guys — are ready to contribute. They have contributed. We’ve got depth. So, we can keep this thing going. Obviously, we’ll miss Jimmy. He’s one of the best players in the league. You can’t minimize that, trivialize it, but you play with who you have, and I like who we have.”

Butler’s injury comes at the worst possible time for a Warriors team that entered Tuesday’s game having won 12 of its last 16 games. Butler was in the midst of his best stretch of the season — averaging 21.9 points in January and providing a stabilizing force behind Warriors star guard Stephen Curry.

“You just look at it matter-of-factly,” Kerr said of the injury. “We get it. This is part of the NBA, part of sports. I’m not gonna spend a whole lot of time analyzing where we are in the food chain of the NBA. I’m gonna focus on what we can do to win tonight and win the next game. We have a good vibe going. We have a really good rhythm.”

Will Kuminga join that rhythm consistently? Many in the Warriors organization were frustrated by the fact that Kuminga didn’t play in a Jan. 2 game against the Oklahoma City Thunder after Kerr said earlier that day in a radio interview on 95.7 The Game in San Francisco that Kuminga would “for sure” play as the Warriors rested Curry, Butler and veteran leader Draymond Green. Kuminga popped up on the injury report about an hour before the game with what the team called lower back soreness and had not seen the floor for a month before Tuesday.

Does Kerr feel Kuminga still wants to play for the Warriors right now?

“I do,” Kerr said.