After listening to offers from the Suns, the Kings, and reportedly even the Bulls, primarily in the context of the Jonathan Kuminga trade saga, the Warriors have shut down all further discussions on a potential sign-and-trade deal for him as they refuse to budge on their demands.
According to Anthony Slater and Shams Charania, ESPN’s NBA Insiders, the Warriors do not like any offers that they have received for Kuminga and are mentally preparing to retain him on the team for the coming season.
“The Warriors, as of right now, have shunned all sign-and-trade offers,” Charania said on ‘SportsCenter’ with Slater and Malika Andrews. “Right now, what we see is a stalemate between both sides, as both sides are at a crossroads for a player who believes he has not been given the full amount of opportunity in Golden State.”
“As of right now, they are shutting down sign-and-trade talks and have found nothing appealing there. And they believe he’s going to be on the roster. Their stance is that he will be on the roster to start next season, and if that’s the qualifying offer, then that’s what it is,” Slater further added.
“The concern there, the flip side of that is the messiness of this. It’s already become a kind of messy restricted free agency. How about when this gets to training camp, how about when the veterans are around, looking around, and saying, is this going to be a distraction in one of Stephen Curry, Jimmy Butler, and Draymond Green’s final contention seasons?”
“I think that’s where there is a potential pivot point, a breaking point in this. But as of now, as Shams mentioned, it’s a stalemate, and it continues to be messy,” concluded Slater.
Now, since the Warriors shut the doors on any potential trade for Jonathan Kuminga, he has two options going forward if he wants to continue in the NBA. He either has to accept the qualifying offer, which he doesn’t want to do, wait out the next season to become an unrestricted free agent, or accept an extension offer that the Warriors are presenting him with, which, as of their last offer, was a two-year, $45 million offer, which Kuminga initially refused.
If Kuminga becomes an unrestricted free agent next season, the Kings are considered to be the likely frontrunners in giving Kuminga the offer closest to what he thinks he deserves. Kuminga reportedly used the restricted free agency negotiations to build a relationship with the Kings’ front office.
The Kings reportedly kept two players off the table at any cost for a potential deal to get Jonathan Kuminga to Sacramento: Keegan Murray and Keon Ellis, before the Warriors pulled the plug on the negotiations.
Will Kuminga accept the qualifying offer and stay in a messy locker room situation with the Warriors for another season? Or will he hold out until they offer him what he feels he deserves? Every passing day of this saga is like watching paint dry. But we never know when to expect a major change in the whole landscape altogether.
