The NBA’s crazy season didn’t even have the courtesy of waiting for games to finish before getting launched. Several hours before the tip of Sunday’s NBA Finals Game 7, which ended the 2024-25 season, Kevin Durant was traded from Phoenix to Houston, with fans shouting the news to him while he was onstage at a collectibles event. The chaos was officially on.
Trades. Free-agent signings. Drafts. Salary aprons. For NBA front offices, this two-week stretch is a frenzy.
The Golden State Warriors got their mega-deal done in February by acquiring Jimmy Butler at the trade deadline, which means they won’t be hunting for another star, either through trade or free agency. Their 2025 first-round draft pick was part of the package for Butler, which makes this week pretty straightforward. During Wednesday’s first round, the Warriors brass can keep an eye on the draft while enjoying the Valkyries, who will be taking on the champion New York Liberty at Chase Center
And in Thursday’s second round they’ll try to find something useful with the 41st pick, though general manager Mike Dunleavy said “you’d be lucky to draft a guy in the second round who can make it at all.” Don’t tell that to Nikola Jokic, who was the 41st pick 11 years ago. Or Draymond Green, the Warriors’ most famous second-round pick.
But even with just a second-round pick and a star already acquired, the Warriors have a big decision to face. They must figure out what to do about restricted free agent Jonathan Kuminga. The Warriors will go through the formality of tendering a qualifying offer to Kuminga, but he can sign an offer sheet with another team. The Warriors can then choose to match that offer.
Will they match any offer that comes in and hold on to the talented young player whose awkward tenure with the team has provided no definitive answer to how his future will look? Or will the Warriors execute a sign-and-trade, and try to find a piece that is more cohesive with their core group and style of play?
“I think we feel pretty comfortable with who JK is as a player and what he can do for our organization,” Dunleavy said this week. “It’s a main priority going into free agency.”
That answer doesn’t tell you much. After all, in one of his first news conferences as general manager two years ago, Dunleavy said that the team planned on having Jordan Poole in the fold for “four more years at least.” Poole was promptly traded to Washington; on Tuesday he was traded again, to New Orleans. Dunleavy holds his cards close, but he’s proven he’s willing to make a bold move.
Would holding onto Kuminga be Dunleavy’s best move? The fan base is definitely split, but Kuminga has talent and promise and is still only 22 years old. He was put in a difficult position last season, out for a long time due to a severe ankle sprain, then returning to a remade team — thanks to Butler’s arrival — that had no place for him. He still has room to grow, but after waiting for Kuminga to blossom for four seasons, is it a smart bet that he do it quickly enough to make sense for the compressed Stephen Curry timeline?
If the Warriors can’t get the perfect player back in a sign-and-trade — and the odds would say they probably can’t — they should keep Kuminga and figure out how to make it work. They’re all smart, talented people. This shouldn’t be that tough. But the process could drag out because the power and decision-making rests with Kuminga.
It’s a tricky situation, but not as difficult as what other teams are facing. The Boston Celtics, one year removed from a title, started offloading players due to Jayson Tatum’s Achilles injury, which will impact their competitiveness next season. On Monday the Celtics traded away Jrue Holiday, a key contributor to that championship run.
Indiana will likely also try to trim payroll due to the devastating Achilles injury to Tyrese Haliburton that instantly transformed the Pacers from a compelling favorite to a question mark.
And how will the Durant-Houston marriage play out? Will he push that young team into championship contention? Will he find happiness with his fifth team?
Every time Durant moves, his legacy becomes murkier. The last time he got past the second round of the playoffs was in his final season with the Warriors, which also ended with an Achilles injury. The two-time champion, league MVP and two-time Finals MVP has become an NBA vagabond, phone always in hand ready to clap back on social media at detractors.
He did that again on Tuesday, angrily responding to a report that he didn’t want to return to the Warriors because he disagreed with Steve Kerr’s coaching style. Kerr, of course, was Durant’s coach last summer at the Olympics, and the partnership went pretty darn well.
In the Netflix “Court of Gold” documentary about the Olympics, Durant was a compelling, emotional figure who adored the Olympic stage. At one point he showed off the large “Just Us” tattoo on his right thigh. It’s a tribute to the words he and the Warriors spoke to each other in every pregame hallway huddle before taking the court.
It’s a permanent reminder of the time when Durant’s talent merged with a team into something historic and beautiful. Can he do that again in Houston?
