Golden State’s preseason board starts with one unresolved frontcourt question: where does rookie Yaxel Lendeborg fit beside Draymond Green? The No. 11 pick arrives after earning Summer League MVP honors and helping the Warriors win the Las Vegas title, and Steve Kerr must decide whether the nearly 24-year-old begins behind Green or gives the opening group a younger, more active look.
The Warriors are coming off a 37-45 season that ended with a 10th-place finish in the West and a SoFi NBA Play-In Tournament exit. Their summer additions include Lendeborg, Georges Niang and Brandon Williams, while Kerr has returned on a new multiyear contract to guide a veteran roster still built around Stephen Curry, Green, Jimmy Butler III and Kristaps Porziņģis.
That core did not get much time together last season. Curry and Butler missed 83 games combined, Porziņģis appeared in only five games with Curry, and Green shared the court with Curry and Porziņģis only four times. Butler has not yet logged a minute alongside Porziņģis.
Health is the central variable for a team trying to extend Curry’s remaining win-now window. Butler is targeting a return around January or February after knee surgery, while Curry enters his 18th season after an injury-affected 2025-26 campaign. Porziņģis, newly signed to a multiyear extension, is positioned as the roster’s potential difference-maker if Golden State can finally get its main pieces into the same rotation.
In the five Curry-Porziņģis appearances last year, Porziņģis scored in double figures four times. The Warriors will be looking for more than those small-sample flashes as they attempt to improve by six wins, a projection that would place them back in the Play-In field for a fourth consecutive season. Golden State is 2-2 in Play-In games since 2024.
From the locker room
Lendeborg has already made his case for a high-energy role. After the Summer League championship in Las Vegas, he said he intends to be “the guy playing with the most energy on the court every night.” That injection would matter for one of the league’s older groups.
Kerr’s return also settles a major question that hung over the team after last season. When he re-signed in May, Kerr said he was eager to continue competing with the group and called his 12 years with the organization a privilege.
Brandin Podziemski is the returning player most likely to expand his offensive responsibility. In his third season, he averaged 13.8 points and played all 82 games. His 1,133 total points and 153 made 3-pointers both ranked second on the roster, trailing only Curry.
Podziemski did not score 20 points in a game until March 2, then reached that mark in half of his remaining outings. He also posted a career-best 30 points on April 11, one of only four 30-point performances by a Warrior outside of Curry, Butler and Porziņģis. With Pat Spencer gone and another contract approaching, Podziemski could see a larger share of the shots around the perimeter.
The schedule offers Golden State some encouraging precedent, too. Each of the previous three Summer League champions before the Warriors reached either the Play-In Tournament or the postseason. The Warriors have finished between seventh and 10th in the West in that same three-year span.
Next tip
The regular-season slate includes five dates with extra weight for the Warriors’ veteran core and their postseason positioning.
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Nov. 5, Heat at Warriors: Klay Thompson returns to the Bay Area after winning four championships with Golden State. He now joins Miami’s bid to contend in 2026-27.
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Jan. 17, Warriors at Heat: Butler could be nearing or making his comeback from knee surgery when Golden State visits Miami. The Heat now have Giannis Antetokounmpo, their first superstar addition of that magnitude since Butler arrived in 2019.
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Feb. 5, Warriors at Hornets: Curry led the NBA with 4.4 made 3-pointers per game for a sixth straight season, but Charlotte rookie Kon Knueppel led the league with 273 total 3s, becoming the first rookie ever to do so. Curry’s usual Charlotte homecoming carries a sharper shooting subplot.
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Mar. 24, 76ers at Warriors: LeBron James, whom Golden State pursued in the offseason, meets the Warriors for the first time after signing with Philadelphia. It will be the first cross-conference meeting between James and Golden State since the Cavaliers-Warriors Finals run from 2015 through 2018.
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Apr. 6, Suns at Warriors: Phoenix, the club that ended Golden State’s 2025-26 season, returns with only four regular-season games left. The Warriors then face Oklahoma City on the second night of a back-to-back, making the stretch important for playoff seeding.
