{"id":549212,"date":"2026-01-20T17:04:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T17:04:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/549212\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T17:04:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T17:04:14","slug":"jimmy-butler-is-out-for-the-season-and-everything-is-on-the-table-for-the-warriors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/549212\/","title":{"rendered":"Jimmy Butler is out for the season, and everything is on the table for the Warriors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Want more ways to catch up on the latest in Bay Area sports? Sign up for the Section 415 email newsletter here<\/a> and subscribe to the Section 415 podcast wherever you listen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jimmy Butler\u2019s season-ending torn ACL<\/a> is devastating for the Warriors. It\u2019s not quite Klay Thompson\u2019s draft night Achilles tear or Kevin Durant\u2019s Finals ruptured Achilles, but it\u2019s a different kind of nightmare. There\u2019s more finality to it. From fading dynasty to fade-to-black.\u00a0<\/p>\n

All from one wrong step in late January.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s different about Butler\u2019s injury is it opens a Pandora\u2019s Box of roster-building dominoes at the most delicate time in Steph Curry\u2019s career. The 37-year-old just earned his 12th All-Star nod<\/a>. Now he\u2019s on a team with zero chance of competing for anything of significance this season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Butler\u2019s injury changes everything for the organization. Before Monday, the objective was clear: make moves to help Curry play meaningful basketball in April and May while he\u2019s still at an elite level. Now, the path forward is totally muddled, and the organization only has two weeks before the trade deadline to pick a direction.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bottoming out this season for a high draft pick suddenly isn\u2019t the most outlandish idea (the Warriors still own their 2026 first-rounder). What that would mean for Curry and Steve Kerr \u2014 on a lame-duck contract \u2014 is tricky to predict.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jonathan Kuminga, who was in the fast lane to a change-of-scenery trade <\/a>before the deadline, might suddenly be in the team\u2019s short-term plans again. If he plays well and keeps the Warriors afloat in the next two weeks, would the franchise dare hold onto him?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Is there a third, creative path back to immediate contention? It would require a bold trade. Butler\u2019s contract was already expensive, and now it\u2019s an albatross $56 million that expires after next season. No team would sign up to pay a 37-year-old coming off ACL surgery that kind of coin. But maybe the Warriors could attach a heap of future draft capital to acquire another team\u2019s distressed asset.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A sidelined Butler is, by default, less reliable than the oft-injured Anthony Davis, for instance. Davis and Butler make the same exact salary this season, making a trade logistically possible.<\/p>\n

All options are worth considering, though none are particularly appealing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s certain is Butler no longer serves a purpose as Curry\u2019s running mate this season, and banking on him recovering to the point where he\u2019s capable of fulfilling that duty next year \u2014 at age 37, coming off major surgery \u2014 would be foolish. Butler is in line to miss the first half of next season and will never be the same; according to In Street Clothes\u2019 Jeff Stotts (opens in new tab)<\/a>, he\u2019s the second-oldest NBA player since 2006 to tear his ACL.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A normal team would probably take this unfortunate opportunity to test its lottery luck. Without a championship chance this year, it wouldn\u2019t be too late to lean into Golden State\u2019s young players, lose a ton of games in the second half, fall into the lottery, and hope the ping pong balls yield a juicy pick in a loaded draft. They could sell off some spare parts and hope to run it back next year with Curry, a recovered Butler, Draymond Green, and a talented rookie.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the Warriors aren\u2019t a normal team. How do you look Curry in the face and sell him on an impromptu gap year? It\u2019s probably not palatable. Asking to rebuild during one of Curry\u2019s last All-Star seasons would be like forcing a Michelin star chef to sling hot dogs outside Chase Center. While Curry has never liked to play GM, his voice should matter the most.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On the Kuminga front, Kerr said the wing \u201cabsolutely\u201d could rejoin the rotation if there\u2019s a need at forward. The 23-year-old wants out, but the roller-coaster saga of his tenure with the club just got a little more interesting. He has slid into a featured role well in his career, like during Andrew Wiggins\u2019 extended absence in the 2022-23 season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Butler\u2019s worst-case scenario injury instantly makes Kuminga the Warriors\u2019 second-most dynamic offensive weapon. Yet the team already knows he doesn\u2019t fit Kerr\u2019s \u201c0.5 basketball\u201d system. It knows he\u2019s not going to turn himself into a consistent defender and rebounder. One more look at the promising wing would just be spinning wheels.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why a trade makes sense. If Dallas is interested in Kuminga, he might be enough of a sweetener in a Davis trade. The Mavericks would get off their massive dead money a year earlier with Butler on their books instead of Davis, and Kuminga represents some upside. Toss in a pick swap or two, and maybe you have a desperation blockbuster cooking.<\/p>\n

But Davis, at 32, is a nightly injury risk and a disastrous contract extension waiting to happen. Other distressed assets at Butler\u2019s salary level include Paul George, Joel Embiid, and Zach LaVine. Trades in those cases would involve the Warriors sacrificing 2027 cap space (and, in most cases, draft capital) for an instant dopamine hit of star power.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Perhaps Butler\u2019s injury makes a player like DeMar DeRozan more appealing to the Warriors. Sacramento loves Kuminga, and DeRozan could at least serve as an offensive facsimile \u2014 mid-post scoring hub, foul-drawing aficionado.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If the Warriors still intend to give Curry something to play for and Kerr something to coach, Butler\u2019s injury should motivate them even more to make a move before Feb. 5. If the franchise recognizes this as the slamming of a championship window, play for ping pong balls. If there\u2019s even a shred of belief left in Kuminga\u2019s upside, roll the ball out and see if he can improve his trade value for the summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Butler has been a Warrior for less than a year. The team is 48-27 after trading for him last February. In such a short time, he injected life into a Warriors season heading nowhere, lived up to his big-game reputation and provided Curry with an elite, if unlikely costar. \u201cHe\u2019s an alpha,\u201d Kerr said. Now it\u2019s possible that his last act as a Warrior was telling his favorite punching bag<\/a>, Buddy Hield, to \u201cshut your bitch ass up.\u201d (opens in new tab)<\/a><\/p>\n

Because, over the next 16 days before the trade deadline, everything \u2014 seriously, everything \u2014 is suddenly possible.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Want more ways to catch up on the latest in Bay Area sports? Sign up for the Section…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":549213,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3786],"tags":[7,479,164,4025,4024,313,6,66,255],"class_list":{"0":"post-549212","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golden-state-warriors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-golden-state","10":"tag-golden-state-warriors","11":"tag-goldenstate","12":"tag-goldenstatewarriors","13":"tag-jimmy-butler","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-warriors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115928515785359913","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549212","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=549212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/549213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}