The Warriors Have to Face Reality: Golden State’s Dynasty Window Is Closing Fast, and Tough Decisions Are Coming for Curry, Kerr, and the Front Office

A team on the rise, built around a game-breaking young superstar, runs into an older group with more pedigree than current production. On paper, it’s supposed to be a passing of the torch. In reality, the veterans summon one more reminder of who they were.

That’s what it felt like the two times the Golden State Warriors beat the Oklahoma City Thunder this season. Steph Curry, well past the phase where he’s supposed to be dunking on the future, did it anyway—hitting impossible shots, warping defenses, forcing fans to ask the same question:

How is he still this good?

Say whatever you want about the state of the Warriors, but don’t call Steph washed. He’s still a legitimate superstar, still one of the best players in the league today.

The problem is that the Warriors are no longer a Steph Curry team with a great supporting cast. They are a Steph Curry team desperately trying to figure out who and what they are around him. And for the first time in a decade, there is no obvious path back to contender status.

A West That Won’t Wait

Draymond Green summed up the landscape bluntly earlier this season:

“I just don’t know that the East has any teams that can compete at a championship level with the teams at the top of the West.”

He went on to note Boston’s injury issues, Cleveland’s inconsistency, and the general murkiness in the Eastern Conference. Hyperbole or not, he’s not entirely wrong. Place this Warriors roster in the East and they instantly become one of the most dangerous teams in that conference. Their flaws wouldn’t feel quite as punishing.

But Golden State doesn’t play in the East. They live in the same Western Conference that houses an OKC juggernaut, Denver’s Jokic‑led machine, ascending powers in Minnesota and Houston, and a collection of talented, flawed teams that can beat you on any given night.

The Warriors, right now, are one of those teams: talented, flawed, and stuck somewhere between “we could make a run” and “we could be in the Play‑In.”

They’re no longer an S‑tier contender. They’re in the middle, hovering in that dangerous zone where it could be better, could be worse—and where every decision about the future carries outsized risk.

A Summer of Stalemates

If the Warriors’ start feels shaky, maybe we should have seen it coming.

Their offseason was defined less by bold moves and more by a stalemate: the Jonathan Kuminga qualifying offer saga.

The Warriors and Kuminga’s camp spent months in a staring contest, each side holding enough leverage to make the other uncomfortable but not enough to force a decisive break. The result was paralysis. While other teams pounced on mid‑tier free agents, Golden State sat in limbo.

By the time Kuminga agreed to a two‑year, $48.5 million deal with a team option on the second year, the free‑agent cupboard in the Warriors’ price range was mostly bare. The “one or two smart signings” that could have meaningfully upgraded the rotation never materialized.

The contract itself tells its own story.

Kuminga got paid—but not in the way players usually want to be paid. Short term, heavy on team control, and structured to keep his future in Golden State very much uncertain. The Warriors, for their part, didn’t want to commit long‑term money to a player they weren’t convinced would justify it.

It was the basketball equivalent of giving a hungry friend one bite of your food so they stop hovering, when what you really need is for them to prove they deserve the whole plate.

Golden State needed Kuminga to earn that plate this season.

He hasn’t.

The Kaminga Conundrum

The Warriors didn’t draft Jonathan Kuminga to be a curiosity.

They took him seventh overall in a loaded draft—over players like Franz Wagner, Alperen Şengün, and Trey Murphy III—because they believed in his star‑level upside. They believed they could mold his raw tools into a two‑way forward who would bridge the gap between eras.

So far, they’ve seen flashes. They have not seen consistency.

The organization has gone out of its way, at least publicly, to keep him engaged. According to multiple reports, Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler (in this timeline as their big swing acquisition), and Draymond Green have all spent time behind the scenes trying to accommodate Kuminga, keep him bought in, and push him toward being the player they need him to be.

They advocated for him. They wanted him to succeed in their ecosystem.

He even got the starting nod to begin the season.

And yet, his numbers dipped across the board from last year—when he was already dealing with erratic minutes and mixed messaging from Steve Kerr.

The box score doesn’t tell the full story. Early in the year, there were moments where it looked like Kuminga was turning a corner: cutting with purpose, defending with focus, trimming some of the wildness from his game. But those stretches never lasted.

Then came the knee tendonitis. Kuminga was moved to the bench for a November game against the Spurs. He didn’t finish the game. His return timetable turned murky. And right on cue, the noise returned.

ESPN reported that Kuminga felt like a “scapegoat” again.

Green and Butler insisted he was “locked in.” But the headlines—fair or not—kept reinforcing the same story: the Kuminga situation is never just about basketball.

The Warriors are not blameless here. They spent a summer treating him like both an asset and a question mark. They declined deals that would have moved him. They then changed his role while his health was in flux.

If he truly believes Kerr has some agenda against him, it’s not hard to understand why his trust might be fragile.

At the same time, Kuminga had one job he could control: strap on the hard hat and prove everyone wrong. The worst thing he could do was feed the narrative that he’s not ready to do the little things that winning demands.

Every new negative headline, whether deserved or fabricated, chips away at his perceived value.

And the Warriors, by not resolving this earlier—either by committing to him fully or maximizing his value on the trade market—have only themselves to blame.

Steph Can’t Save Everyone

As messy as the Kuminga storyline has been, it’s only one part of a larger issue: this team lives and dies with Steph to a degree that is no longer sustainable.

The metrics are stark.

Per Cleaning the Glass, with Curry on the floor, Golden State scores 119.3 points per 100 possessions—good enough to sit alongside offenses like the Lakers and Raptors. That’s strong company.

With him off? The Warriors fall to 113 points per 100 possessions. The gap doesn’t sound enormous, but in today’s NBA it’s the difference between “borderline elite” and “bottom third.” The team offensive rating drops into the range occupied by the Grizzlies and Nets, who are hovering near the bottom of the league.

In other words: when Steph sits, they look like a lottery team.

Curry will be 37 this season. He is still astonishingly productive and still capable of flipping games and playoff series by himself. But there is a limit to how much one player—even one of the greatest offensive forces ever—can hold together when the roster around him is misaligned.

The Warriors played with more cohesion last year. Draymond said as much. This year, he’s been blunt about the lack of collective buy‑in, saying that not everyone is prioritizing team basketball. Butler echoed those concerns, calling for more sacrifice and fight from certain players.

You don’t have to guess who they’re talking about; the frustration is palpable.

When defensive anchors like Green and Butler are openly questioning effort and adherence to the game plan, you can feel the internal panic.

Golden State was eventually forced into a choice—not the splashy blockbuster many fans wanted, but a structural decision: keep straddling eras, or start committing to one direction.

They hesitated.

The Deals They Didn’t Make

Across the last year, the Warriors have had multiple chances to recalibrate around Curry. They passed on most of them.

Some of those decisions are defensible. Others may haunt them.

1. The Role Players: Grayson Allen, Royce O’Neale, Nick Richards

The Phoenix Suns reportedly called with a Kaminga‑centered offer that included Grayson Allen—who dropped 42 points on the Pelicans this season—and names like Royce O’Neale and Nick Richards.

Those are the kind of tough, versatile role players who help good teams become great ones: shooting, defense, size, no illusions about their place in the hierarchy.

Golden State balked. They didn’t want to inherit future contract headaches from Phoenix or sell low on Kaminga for non‑star pieces.

You can understand the logic. You don’t trade a top‑10 pick with theoretical star upside lightly. But it also meant passing on the kind of depth that might have stabilized this season.

2. Malik Monk and a Protected First

The Sacramento Kings reportedly offered Malik Monk and a protected first‑round pick in a Kaminga trade. The Warriors would likely have had to include Brandin Podziemski or Moses Moody to even things out.

In that scenario, Poziemski—or “Pods”—probably would’ve been the odd man out.

Golden State declined, largely because the pick was protected. An unprotected Sacramento first could have become a centerpiece in a bigger future deal. A protected one? Less so.

Again, the logic is clear: if you’re giving up a potential star, you want something you can later convert into a real star. But the end result was the same: another opportunity to upgrade the present without fully committing to the future, passed on.

3. Alex Caruso

Perhaps the most glaring miss was Alex Caruso.

The Warriors reportedly turned down a deal that would have brought Caruso to Golden State in exchange for Kuminga. Imagine a defense featuring Caruso, Butler, and Draymond Green.

Whatever else you think about this team, that trio would have made life miserable for opposing offenses.

Caruso is exactly the kind of role player contending teams dream about: elite on-ball defense, low usage, smart decision-making, playoff-tested. He would have immediately addressed the concerns Butler and Green voiced about boxing out, following scouting reports, and stopping dribble penetration.

Chicago would have gotten a potential cornerstone to build around. Kuminga would have had the chance to flourish in a fresh environment.

It could have been a rare win-win.

Golden State said no.

The Star They Really Needed

Role players are important. But the Warriors’ biggest misstep may have come in their pursuit—or more accurately, their lack of pursuit—of one star who fits them like a custom-made glove.

Luri Markkanen.

Now one of the most versatile big men in the league, Markkanen is having a blistering bounce-back season for the Utah Jazz. He scores efficiently at volume, shoots with range, attacks mismatches, and doesn’t need to dominate the ball to impact the game.

He might be the best non‑ball‑dominant scoring big in basketball.

According to reports, Golden State had strong interest in trading for Markkanen in the 2024 offseason. The fit was obvious:

A 7‑foot sharpshooter who thrives off movement and screens.
Comfortable playing off the ball in motion offenses.
Capable of attacking closeouts and punishing switches.

In Steve Kerr’s system—heavy on off‑ball screens, split cuts, and constant motion—Markkanen would have been terrifying. In a frontcourt with Draymond, he would have masked Green’s lack of scoring while amplifying his playmaking.

On defense, Markkanen’s length and mobility, combined with Draymond’s instincts, would have produced a frontcourt capable of holding its own against almost any lineup.

If nothing else, he would have forced Kerr to play bigger—which, given Kerr’s nearly pathological love of small lineups, might have been a blessing.

The Warriors didn’t pull the trigger. Or more accurately, they couldn’t stomach the price.

Danny Ainge, the Asking Price, and Draymond’s Advice

Jazz CEO Danny Ainge has built a reputation over the last decade: if you call him, be prepared to overpay.

According to NBC Sports Bay Area, Utah’s asking price for Markkanen was enormous: the Warriors’ entire young core—Kuminga, Moody, Podziemski—and multiple first‑round picks.

At the time, it sounded like too much. Golden State was coming off a failed pursuit of Paul George and facing internal questions about whether it made sense to “sell the future” for a team that might be good, but not great, with its current stars.

In that context, GM Mike Dunleavy reportedly told Kerr:

“It doesn’t make sense to sell your entire future for a team that you think can be pretty good, but isn’t awesome with the stars at this stage of their careers.”

Draymond, interestingly, agreed.

“I’m a big fan of Markkanen’s game,” he reportedly told Dunleavy and owner Joe Lacob. “But I think if you want to do something so huge, you better be certain that this is the move. You don’t win these things against Danny Ainge. I look at history.”

It was a remarkable moment of selflessness from a player whose own decision-making (see: the Jordan Poole punch) contributed to the Warriors’ dynasty slippage. Green was, in effect, arguing against mortgaging the franchise’s future for a better version of a team he knew had limitations.

In a vacuum, it’s admirable. It’s also painful to consider what might have been.

Markkanen is averaging around 28 points per game this season. He’s the kind of offensive force who can carry stretches without disrupting Curry’s rhythm. He’s young enough to be a long-term pillar, yet polished enough to help right now.

Ask yourself: if Golden State could revisit that discussion with the benefit of hindsight, would they still walk away?

Between Timelines, Between Identities

The Warriors have spent years trying to walk a tightrope no team has successfully navigated: contend today while developing tomorrow’s stars.

They drafted Kuminga and Moody in the lottery. They added James Wiseman before that. They flirted with a “two timelines” model—Steph, Klay, and Dray on one; the young guys on another.

Wiseman is gone. Kuminga is stuck in limbo. Moody is useful, but far from a sure future star. Podziemski looks like a keeper, but more as a connector than a franchise changer.

They didn’t fully commit to any one path:

They didn’t go all‑in on the present by cashing out every chip for Markkanen or someone like Brandon Ingram.
They didn’t pivot to a soft rebuild, trading veterans for picks and handing the keys to their youth.

They tried to do a little of both. And now, they’re stuck somewhere in the middle.

An anonymous league executive recently called Kuminga “one of the best trade chips in the league,” even acknowledging he can’t be moved until mid‑January. Maybe that’s still true in a vacuum. But the larger trade market suggests that theoretical value isn’t what it used to be.

Brandon Ingram, a proven multi‑time All‑Star, recently netted New Orleans a return headlined by Bruce Brown Jr., Kelly Olynyk, and a couple of picks. If that’s the going rate for “known” star power, how much more can you really expect for a still‑inconsistent forward with a cloudy reputation?

Golden State seems to be wrestling with the same question everyone else is: Is Kaminga a future star worth waiting for—or a depreciating asset whose value peaked in theory, not reality?

What Now?

The Warriors are not doomed.

Any team with Steph Curry, Draymond Green, and a healthy Jimmy Butler (in this scenario) has a puncher’s chance in any series. Kerr remains one of the smartest coaches in the league, even if his small‑ball habits can drive fans—and occasionally his own big men—crazy.

But the margin for error is gone.

They’ve already missed on multiple chances to reshape the roster around Curry. They turned down functional role players who would’ve raised their floor. They balked at an expensive but potentially franchise‑altering move for Luri Markkanen.

At some point, the questions become unavoidable:

Do you believe in Jonathan Kuminga enough to build around him once Steph fades?
If not, what are you realistically getting for him now?
Is the priority maximizing the last 2–3 years of Curry’s window, or preserving a future that might not materialize?

If you’re Golden State, you don’t want to wake up two years from now having neither: an aging Curry with no real shot at a title and a young core that never became what you hoped.

Maybe the Warriors are right to wait for the “perfect” Kaminga deal. Maybe Danny Ainge’s price for Markkanen was, and remains, too high. Maybe standing pat was the responsible long-term move.

But the NBA is rarely kind to teams that live in the middle.

And right now, that’s exactly where the Warriors are: no longer a dynasty, not yet reborn, trying to keep their balance on a shrinking tightrope between eras.

They still have Steph. That alone keeps them dangerous.

The question is whether they’ll give him the help he deserves before the clock finally runs out.