Getty Derrick Rose, who the Golden State Warriors were ready to target, and Russell Westbrook, now of the New York Knicks and LA Clippers.
The Golden State Warriors made a big change at the trade deadline this year. They shipped out James Wiseman and brought back Gary Payton II, making it clear that they needed more depth on the roster. And while Payton II is injured, he’ll still provide them with a nice presence off the bench.
And according to sources who spoke with Sean Deveney of Heavy Sports, the Warriors were close to making a move for another veteran player. If he had gotten bought out, the Warriors were supposedly interested in bringing in Derrick Rose.
“Not that surprised he did not get a buyout, no. The team option for next year complicated things a little bit, and he also just did not want to leave that situation. He likes Thibs. He likes [the] New York [Knicks]. But it raises the question of what is next for him because everything was laid out for him to go to the team and ask out. They would have done it. He could have gone to [the] Phoenix [Suns] to try to win a title, he could have gone back home to Chicago, both of those teams would have jumped at him. Golden State was ready to get in the mix there, too, and [the] Miami [Heat]. He would have had some really good options. He wanted to stay in a place where he is not playing, though, and where the team is pretty good but not a real contender. Derrick’s loyal. He is loyal to Thibs. He is loyal to [Knicks official William] Wesley. But they would have been OK with letting him go somewhere else. He did not want to. You have to wonder if he is going to keep playing much longer because he was in a position to reconstruct the end of his career, and he just did not take it.”
At 34 years old, Rose would have given the Warriors another veteran guard to bring off the bench. He isn’t playing at the same level he was in his prime, or even at the level he was playing at a couple of years ago, but he would have still been able to give the Warriors decent minutes in a limited role.
Steph, Klay, & Draymond Causing Issues
However, while adding veterans to the roster may have improved the team’s title hopes, their current vets might be causing problems. According to Matt Steinmetz of 95.7 The Game’s “Steiny & Guru,” Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green are causing issues behind the scenes.
“But we’ve gotten to the point where it’s like, Steph, Draymond, and Klay Thompson, like, they’ve become hard to play with,” Steinmetz said. “It’s hard to play with them, because they’re so demanding. And they’re so, I’ll say it, judgmental. And you know what they also have been? They’ve been exclusive this year. That’s what their championship veterans have been. They have been exclusive. They have not included the young players like great leaders would. They put up a line between themselves and the young players, as opposed to acknowledging their young players and trying to help them. Instead, it feels like they are saying, ‘We can’t play with these guys. You want us to play with these guys? You can not win.’”
Stephen Curry Sounds Off on Warriors
Meanwhile, Curry recently stressed the importance of treating every game from here on out like a playoff game, as they can’t afford to take nights off.
“The fact that we are not in a safe enough spot to do that,” Curry said via the NBA Interviews YouTube channel. “You just got to look at the standings and keep it real. We have some tough opponents coming up, so [it’s] just a matter of, what we did on the road while me and Wiggs and GP [Gary Payton II] are out. I mean, they won five games in a row. Because you can rally around being short-handed, and the guys played amazing. When we come back on the road, those same principles apply because it’s way harder to do it away from Chase [Center], and we obviously haven’t shown that we can do that. And like I said, we’re not in a safe spot in terms of the standings or where we’re at, or just the vibe around how we’re playing. So, we got to keep repeating that until you’re blue in the face until you actually do it.”
