{"id":526818,"date":"2026-01-10T11:03:24","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T11:03:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/526818\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T11:03:24","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T11:03:24","slug":"steph-right-to-shut-down-rivalry-talk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/526818\/","title":{"rendered":"Steph Right to Shut Down Rivalry Talk"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Golden State Warriors (21-18) blew out the Sacramento Kings (8-30) by a final score of 137-103 on Friday at Chase Center. <\/p>\n

Stephen Curry had a game-high 27 points and 10 assists. De’Anthony Melton had 19 points, and Jimmy Butler added 15.<\/p>\n

Here are three takeaways from Friday’s game. <\/p>\n

Steph Is Right That This Isn’t a Rivalry<\/p>\n

After the game, Curry was asked if the Kings and Warriors are rivals. <\/p>\n

“Geographically, yes,” he said. “That’s about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The reporter provided the context that the Warriors won a seven-game series against the Kings three years ago and then lost in Sacramento in the play-in tournament two years ago, but still, it’s outrageous to even try to call this a rivalry. <\/p>\n

Since the beginning of their first title-winning season, the Warriors are 31-13 in the regular season against the Kings. <\/p>\n

The Kings have not won a playoff series since 2004. The Warriors have won four titles since the beginning of the 2014-15 season. <\/p>\n

Need I say more?<\/p>\n

Non-Steph Lineup Continues to Shine with Big Run<\/p>\n

With three minutes to go in the third quarter, this game was tied at 84. <\/p>\n

That’s when a lineup of Brandin Podziemski, Will Richard, Melton, Butler and Al Horford closed the quarter on a 13-0 run.<\/p>\n

Going into Friday, lineups with Butler on the court and Curry off the court had a plus-5.8 net rating, per Cleaning the Glass<\/a>. Historically, the Warriors have lost those minutes, even with some championship-caliber rosters, which shows just how impactful Butler has been. <\/p>\n

Podz finished a game-high plus-28. Horford finally looks healthy and in rhythm, as he had nine points and five rebounds in 13 minutes. Melton went 3-of-6 from three, which means he’s 12 of his last 24 from three after starting the season 6-of-36. Richard hasn’t put up big stat lines recently, but he made winning plays Friday en route to a plus-20 plus-minus. <\/p>\n

I’m not sure if this specific lineup will play a lot, as it had just 30 possessions entering Friday. The bigger point is Butler-without-Curry lineups are often winning their matchups, which means the Warriors can win at a high rate if Curry lineups can hold serve or even barely win their matchups. <\/p>\n

Monk Shows Why He Doesn’t Have Much Trade Value<\/p>\n

Over the last few days, some fans and media members have speculated that the Kings can facilitate a three-team trade for the Warriors to land Michael Porter Jr. The basic premise is the Kings want Jonathan Kuminga, the Warriors want Porter, and the Nets don’t want Kuminga, so surely the Nets will be happy if they get Malik Monk instead, right?<\/p>\n

Friday’s game was another example why that feels far-fetched. <\/p>\n

In 19 minutes, Monk went 4-of-10 with eight points, two rebounds, one assist and two turnovers. He was a minus-17. <\/p>\n

That’s how it’s been all season with Monk. He’s not doing enough offensively to make up for the fact that he’s a mediocre defender. <\/p>\n

The league is valuing one-way players less and less. The Hawks didn’t even get a first-round pick in their Trae Young trade. The Grizzlies are trying to deal Ja Morant. <\/p>\n

Those two are often brilliant offensively. So why would the Nets want Monk, who struggles just as much as Young and Morant defensively but doesn’t do nearly as much offensively?<\/p>\n

That’s why the Warriors weren’t interested in the Kings’ offer for Kuminga<\/a> in the offseason. The Dubs believe they can do better than getting Monk in a Kuminga trade, and I’m betting that they will be proved correct. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Golden State Warriors (21-18) blew out the Sacramento Kings (8-30) by a final score of 137-103 on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":526819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3792],"tags":[7,4056,6,986,477,4055],"class_list":{"0":"post-526818","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sacramento-kings","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-kings","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sacramento","12":"tag-sacramento-kings","13":"tag-sacramentokings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115870473875586383","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/526819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}