SAN FRANCISCO — The expectations for this season are all the way off for the Golden State Warriors. The pressure they came into the season with to try and push for one more championship for Stephen Curry got popped like a balloon when Jimmy Butler tore the ACL in his right knee on Jan. 19.
In its place, frustration has grown within a rabid fan base that was hoping the front office would find a way to add Giannis Antetokounmpo or another big star to help fill the large void that Butler’s injury created. But as the Warriors stare down the final 27 games of the regular season after the All-Star break, they do so without the full force of those early ambitions weighing them down.
The Warriors aren’t going to win a title this season — and they likely weren’t even with a healthy Butler — but as they start the second half of the season, they can still find success in a season when they lost a lot of hope along the way. It’s just not the same kind of championship-level success that has become the standard within the organization — but it’s still an accomplishment given how low this season could have gone in the wake of Butler’s injury.
After a deadline deal that sent Jonathan Kuminga and Buddy Hield to the Atlanta Hawks in exchange for Kristaps Porziņģis, it feels as if a cloud has been lifted from the Warriors, and they are playing a little looser. It’s not that Kuminga wasn’t liked by his teammates — it’s more that up and down the organization, there was relief that the situation was finally over. The cloud that had been hovering over the group and the distraction of Kuminga’s uncertain future are finally gone.
With Porziņģis in the fold, the Warriors are going to get a different look on the floor. They get a big man who can hit from the outside and be a rim protector when needed. They also get a player who already has some rhythm with Al Horford from the pair’s days with the Boston Celtics and who was open about how excited he was to finally be playing with Curry. Most importantly, Porziņģis’ new teammates are excited to play with him.
“Kristaps can do so much,” Warriors guard De’Anthony Melton said after Wednesday’s loss to the San Antonio Spurs. “He’s a matchup nightmare for a lot of teams. You see with the Spurs, you have Wemby (Victor Wembanyama), who’s 7-a lot, and the stuff he can do and the matchup nightmares he brings to the table. So I think (Porziņģis being) out there, it’s just going to give us a lot of size and a lot of mismatches that we need. Some teams he’s gonna kill just cause they can’t physically match up with him.”
The question for the Warriors has never been about Porziņģis’ fit — it’s whether they believe the 30-year-old big man can stay on the floor after the last two seasons that have been defined by various health issues. Porziņģis has already said he feels a comfort level with the Warriors’ training staff and is confident he will be able to stay out there. Coach Steve Kerr has said repeatedly that the Warriors wouldn’t have made the deal to acquire Porziņģis unless they believed he could stay on the floor. If he can, it opens up a variety of new possibilities for the organization going into the summer.
If Porziņģis’ two-month tryout with the Warriors goes well, they can try and find a way to re-sign him, something general manager Mike Dunleavy acknowledged as a possibility during his post-deadline news conference. It also allows for the possibility that Porziņģis’ new deal could be used as a sign-and-trade for a bigger star over the summer. Either way, the Warriors are banking on Porziņģis finding his form because it’s in the best interest of the player and the organization. Whether Porziņģis stays with Golden State or not, he has to prove to the rest of the league that he can stay on the floor and produce.
It’s another reason why the last third of the schedule provides an intriguing backdrop for a team that has already been through an array of challenges this season. Melton has fit in seamlessly for the Warriors on both ends of the floor as he continues to recover from an ACL injury. Melton seems poised to decline his player option and enter free agency this summer. At 27, would Melton consider taking less money on the open market to stay with a team that he feels comfortable with? Either way, he figures to be playing for a new contract in the last two months of the season.
Horford was plagued by injury and inconsistency throughout the first half of the season but has found his old form during the last few weeks and is playing his best basketball of the season on both ends of the floor. The 39-year-old was open about the fact that he signed with the Warriors over the summer, in part, because he felt they gave him the best chance to win a championship. Horford also noted that he hoped the Warriors would be the final stop in what could be a Hall of Fame career — so will he see enough down the stretch to pick up the player option he has for about $6 million next season?
Brandin Podziemski is another interesting case study. He has struggled to find consistency throughout a season where a portion of the fan base has been frustrated by some of the comments he made early in the season — and the fact that he hasn’t taken the jump that many were hoping to see from the start. The post-All-Star break sprint to the finish offers Podziemski not only a fresh start but a reminder of his next contract step on the horizon. He will be a restricted free agent at the end of the 2026-27 season and could help himself in those negotiations if he closes well and puts an up-and-down first half behind him.
Swingman Moses Moody has recently done just that and is playing well after an inconsistent start to the season. Moody is averaging 15 points and 3.8 rebounds a game in February and has scored in double figures in 14 of his last 15 games. Gui Santos has had a similar renaissance with more minutes — averaging 14.2 points, 5.4 rebounds and 4.2 assists in February. Pat Spencer is shooting 46.7 percent from 3-point land over his last 10 games. The Warriors’ roster is full of younger players with a chip on their shoulder and something to prove late in the season.
At the back of the roster are the two stalwarts who have helped lead the organization to four titles — they come into the last third of the season in completely different places. Draymond Green has struggled to find a groove all season. He admitted recently he felt there was a chance he might get dealt — the first time he had that feeling in 14 seasons with the organization. Now, Green has a chance to change the narrative with one final push before the Play-In Tournament, and potentially, the playoffs. He showed again in Wednesday’s loss to the Spurs that he remains at his best in shorter minutes against the best competition. He again went toe-to-toe against Wembanyama defensively, while almost racking up a triple-double.
Kerr has said repeatedly during the season that he maintains a strong relationship with Green and that the pair has an open line of communication — so would Kerr consider bringing Green off the bench more as a trial run for what may happen in the future? Speaking of the future, Green is a lot more perceptive than the average fan gives him credit for. He knows there’s a chance this could be his last season with the Warriors, especially after the uncertainty of the trade deadline. He helped build the standard for the organization alongside Curry and Klay Thompson — it’s a standard he’d like to try and live up to as he faces an uncertain summer, which includes likely picking up a player option worth almost $28 million.
As always with the Warriors, every road within the organization leads back to Curry. He is the man that everything, and everyone, revolves around. First and foremost, they have to make sure that the runner’s knee issue that caused him to miss five straight games is behind him. Kerr is hopeful that Curry is on track to play on Feb. 19 against the Boston Celtics in the first game after the break, but time will tell how the knee holds up. If it does, the Warriors are well-positioned to make the last 27 games interesting. They are 29-26, have 10 games left against bad/tanking teams and 13 games remaining at home after a brutal travel schedule to start the season. They also have a chance to build momentum going into the offseason — momentum they appeared to be building in small spurts before the break.
“I think as a coach that’s all you want to see is competition, energy and execution,” Kerr said after the Spurs game. “And so if we can accomplish those things, then I think we’ll be successful. We feel good about adding Kristaps. It gives us another dimension. Obviously, getting Steph back will change everything, but success will come if we continue the process we’ve been showing.”
The Warriors’ process will be fun to watch if Curry stays on the floor. It always is. But the Warriors will also be the beneficiary of something they haven’t had in years — a playoff push devoid of any expectations. Nobody expects the Warriors to do anything of significance down the stretch — especially without Butler to help take the pressure off Curry.
But what the rest of the league isn’t factoring in is the perceptiveness of one of the game’s all-time great players. Curry knows he has only a handful of postseason runs left in his career, and he realizes that he needs to take advantage of any opportunity he can. The Warriors don’t have enough talent to make another serious run at a title this season, but they do have enough talented players with something to prove to at least make things rough for anybody in their path. With a healthy Curry leading the way, that’s a challenge that any team in the Warriors’ way would rather not face.