After many weeks of shuffling in a multitude of free agents for workouts, the Warriors have finally started to make some decisions on the initial training camp roster ahead of pre-season.
They reportedly agreed to a deal with veteran nemesis Rodney McGruder yesterday and long-time Warriors target, [not-this-guy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WK7lIjFsGvg), Rudy Gay this morning.
The additions of Gay and McGruder set up the Warriors’ camp competition for their two vacant 15-man roster spots of which only one is expected to be filled ahead of the season due to financial and roster flexibility concerns.
This is how the training camp roster looks as of this moment.
https://preview.redd.it/bgghjph3otqb1.png?width=924&format=png&auto=webp&s=713fbaa19876ea90d2686c3308a79b1a47ef0951
More information is in my regularly updated interactive Warriors [spreadsheet](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aSo_Ni5pqrs6E9PbCZgfGKzq5qjklm60h6Ykw3lYSxE/edit#gid=268769577).
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The Warriors have 13 guaranteed deals. All of these guys are essentially locked in to start the season and have their roster spots secured.
There are 22 players listed, however, off-season rosters can only be up to 21. What this means is that at least one of the Exhibit 10 signings will not begin on the training camp roster. There’s a lot of fluidity with the camp deals. Expect the Warriors to announce a 21-man roster and for that to change somewhat during the course of the pre-season. The Warriors will be waiving some of their Exhibit 10 guys pretty early on and then signing and waiving some more, even on the same day. While these moves may seem strange, they all have to do with setting up their G League roster for the upcoming season by acquiring player rights and handing out bonuses. Someone like Jayce Johnson for example who has a very low chance of making the roster, even at a two-way spot, will likely just be signed and then immediately waived so he can receive a bonus for returning to Santa Cruz.
The Warriors have two players signed to two-way deals. While these contracts are almost completely non-guaranteed and do not count against the salary cap whatsoever giving teams flexibility, given the caliber of players Quiñones and Garuba are, expect them to have those spots pretty firmly locked up and the Warriors will look to add a third and final two-way next to them.
Both Gay and McGruder will be signing non-guaranteed deals, which essentially means they are auditioning for a roster spot and can be cut ahead of the regular season with no penalty for the Warriors. It is not remotely a given they will be making the roster.
In fact, I’m personally of the opinion that neither will in fact make the roster and the Warriors’ 14th spot will actually be filled by a player that is currently on another team’s roster.
There are a number of teams as you can see [here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PJztyEemeIkhB_Sxjncp_-qkrbC_kHy2r1QiNj6TJsI/edit#gid=0) including the Spurs, Thunder, and Wizards who are taking advantage of the 21-man off-season roster by holding out to more than 15 guaranteed contracts and will have to cut those players ahead of the regular season. Players like Danilo Gallinari, Cedi Osman, Reggie Bullock, Aaron Wiggins, Xavier Cooks, etc could all become available at some point during the pre-season and would be more intriguing additions than what the Warriors currently have.
While McGruder and Gay seemingly have the inside track as of now, keep in mind the Warriors could only work with what’s currently available to them on the free-agent market, and they had to put some sort of a camp competition together. Especially with trade noise around the league, a lot can change in the next couple of weeks, so I wouldn’t pencil either of these guys into a roster spot just yet.
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3 comments
Please enlighten me.
Does this mean JTA will not compete for a spot?
Informative as always.
I’m still holding out hope we can find a legit Center for roster slot #14. Anyone who is actually likely to play meaningful minutes other than in case of emergency would be nice in that slot, of course, but I still think we need the length.
Another way I look at it now is that anyone BUT a Center is potentially taking minutes away from guys I’d like to see get some playing time. If we sign a 7-footer backup, it would be for specific situations where no other reserve would be suitable.
Thank you for this information you make it so helpful to understand. Especially the Gay and McGruder signings that should have been more clear about the “non-guaranteed” deals they recently signed which confused even me at first.