{"id":597077,"date":"2026-02-11T17:11:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T17:11:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/597077\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T17:11:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T17:11:13","slug":"insider-details-decision-to-draft-jonathan-kuminga-over-franz-wagner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/597077\/","title":{"rendered":"Insider details decision to draft Jonathan Kuminga over Franz Wagner"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Recently, the <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Golden State Warriors<\/a> opted to shake things up by<a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\/warriors-rumors-jonathan-kuminga-meeting-december-steve-kerr-slamming-whiteboard\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> trading Jonathan Kuminga<\/a> and Buddy Hield to the Atlanta Hawks in exchange <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/golden-state-warriors\/warriors-news-kristaps-porzingis-pumped-to-play-unreal-stephen-curry\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">for Kristaps Porzingis<\/a>. The move officially ended the strained relationship between Kuminga and Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, which had resulted in several benchings this season<\/p>\n<p>The Warriors took Kuminga at seventh overall back in the 2021 NBA Draft, and they passed on multiple future All-Stars in the process, including Orlando Magic forward <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/tag\/franz-wagner\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Franz Wagner<\/a> and Atlanta Hawks forward Jalen Johnson. Recently, Anthony Slater of ESPN broke down how close the Warriors were to selecting Wagner.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was a group of coaches on the staff who attended Wagner&#8217;s workout, team sources said, and came away adamant he&#8217;d be an ideal choice and fit in Kerr&#8217;s system,\u201d reported Slater on ESPN.com.<\/p>\n<p>However, \u201cThen-assistant coach Kenny Atkinson ran the workout and maintained strong belief in Kuminga through his final days with the organization,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Team owner Joe Lacob was also reportedly in the Kuminga camp <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/story\/_\/id\/47880753\/inside-ugly-5-year-split-jonathan-kuminga-warriors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">leading up to the draft.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cLacob pushed for his preferred option, team sources said. Myers and Dunleavy, then an assistant GM, didn&#8217;t object,\u201d reported Slater.<\/p>\n<p>Kuminga showed some signs of promise during his tenure with Golden State, flashing his elite athleticism and defensive versatility. However, his inability to adapt to Kerr&#8217;s system over the years, as well as Kerr&#8217;s seeming willingness to let personal feuds dictate rotational decisions, ultimately left his Warriors tenure feeling like a disappointment.<\/p>\n<p>Now, Kuminga will get a chance to play with the Hawks, who are looking to build a good supporting cast around Johnson. Meanwhile, the Warriors will be praying that Porzingis will be able to stay healthy, something that did not occur during his brief tenure in Atlanta.<\/p>\n<p>The Warriors will next hit the floor on Wednesday night at home against the San Antonio Spurs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Recently, the Golden State Warriors opted to shake things up by trading Jonathan Kuminga and Buddy Hield to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,403,164,867,6,12,6050],"class_list":{"0":"post-597077","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-draft","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-franz-wagner","10":"tag-golden-state-warriors","11":"tag-jonathan-kuminga","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-nba-draft","14":"tag-nba-rumors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116053113945985669","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597077","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=597077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}