SAN FRANCISCO — As the Golden State Warriors prepare to travel to Hawaii for training camp, there is a consensus about their group traveling: They are a better team than last season.
“We feel good about the team in the sense that we’ve improved the team,” Warriors general manager Mike Dunleavy said in a press conference Thursday. “At its core, we have a good team [but] we’re probably as impatient of a franchise as you can be right now given our timeline and all that.”
That timeline, of course, is “insignificantly” centered around Stephen Curry, who signed a two-year, $62.2 million extension keeping him with the Warriors through the 2026-27 season.
But Dunleavy feels confident they can make the most of those remaining years.
“There’s a fine line between impatience and being undisciplined,” he said. “I think I feel good about the discipline that we’ve had this summer and the roster that we’ve built and the growth from within that we’re going to have.”
According to coach Steve Kerr, he feels he has 12 to 13 players on his roster who could be in the rotation — a problem he said he’s had in the past. But, over the last two years this has led to more confusion and inconsistencies than deadly depth. This year, however, is different, he says because of the players they brought in.
And, more importantly, because of the inner growth he expects to see.
“I expect a big year from [Andrew Wiggins],” Kerr said. Wiggins missed two months during the 2022-23 season, and another week last season to care for his father, who died in July. But before that, Wiggins was a crucial piece to the Warriors’ 2022 title.
“He looks physically really fit,” Kerr said. Just talking to him, he sounds very motivated. He is very calm. I think he’s in a place where he knows the last two years have been difficult for a lot of reasons, and I think he’s primed to get back to where he was two years ago.”
Kerr named Wiggins as a possible player to pick up some of the scoring slack left by Thompson’s departure, and also expressed the need for him to play the same level of defense he did two seasons ago.
One of the biggest areas Kerr wants to see his team improve is on the defensive end, especially in transition.
“Our pass defense fell off the map last year. A huge emphasis in camp will be to shore that up,” Kerr said. “We do have, I think, better personnel this year to become a better defensive team, barring injury and things like that … Traditionally we’ve been a top 10 defense. I just want to get back to being really good at that end. knowing that we can rely on our ability to get stops, whatever the ranking is.”
Transition offense will also be a focus. With how different the roster looks since they won their most recent title, Kerr says he doesn’t plan to de-emphasize playing with a fast pace and a lot of ball movement.
But he admitted that with such a different staff, he will look at ways to adjust his system to best suit his players.
“It opens up an opportunity to maybe play a little bit differently,” Kerr said.
He continued: “I think where I can do better is to simplify some of the actions that we do, so that the players know exactly what they are doing and don’t have too many options for them. So finding that balance where we can keep our. identity but simplify things and make it a little cleaner, that’s the challenge.”
After winning 46 games last season but failing to make the playoffs, Kerr and Dunleavy are not pursuing a win total they want to achieve to reflect a successful year. They are also not ready to define what the floor or ceiling is with the group they have.
But what they are sure of is the urgency with which they must operate to maximize Curry.
“You’re always looking to improve, improve your team … We have a lot of good basketball players, and then we have most of our assets. We have ways to improve. . We’re going to be aggressive,” he said. “Does that mean we’re definitely going to do something? No. We were super aggressive last year around the deadline. Didn’t do much. You have to have a partner … But the effort and the urgency. will always be there.”
