The Golden State Warriors have announced that summer signing De’Anthony Melton will be ruled out for the rest of the 2024-25 season after suffering an ACL tear which will require surgery to repair.
“De’Anthony Melton, who has missed the last two games due to a sprained left ACL, underwent further testing to determine the extent of the injury. The tests indicated that it is in De’Anthony’s best interest to proceed with ACL surgery. He is scheduled for surgery in the near future and will miss the remainder of the 2024-25 season.”
Melton was averaging 10.3 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 2.8 assists, having started two games for the Warriors.
Steve Kerr reacted to Melton’s injury by expressing his disappointment at losing a player he thought would have been the perfect fit next to Stephen Curry in the starting lineup.
“It’s terrible news, I feel so bad for De’Anthony. He’s such a perfect fit for us and we were excited to have him and he was clearly going to be our starter next to Steph. The good news is that he’s a young guy, and the surgery is pretty routine these days, so he should be able to come back and resume his career really well. I feel awful for him and bad for us too.”
Kerr also revealed that Melton’s starting spot will be given to Lindy Waters for the foreseeable future.
“I like Lindy in the starting lineup, he’s started the last few. He’s a very good two-way player and he fills that role well, so we’ll keep starting him and see how it goes.”
Steve Kerr on De'Anthony Melton's season-ending surgery and Lindy Waters taking over the starting shooting guard spot next to Steph for the foreseeable future. pic.twitter.com/z1NfhtNIeq
— KNBR (@KNBR) November 21, 2024
Last week, Kerr named Melton as the starting shooting guard of the team due to his certified 3-and-D ability elevating the Warriors’ level of play.
“I like this lineup with Melton, I anticipate doing it again. I think it gives us a very good two-way lineup… He’s a really good passer, an excellent shooter, and a really good on-ball defender. Melton is someone we talked about a lot in camp and here in the early going, and we really liked it… I would like for the starting group that was out there (Curry, Melton, Wiggins, Green, Jackson-Davis) tonight is the one for us going forward.”
Unfortunately, Kerr won’t get to see how this lineup would end up doing over a big sample size with Melton being ruled out for the entire season. He joined Golden State this summer on a one-year, $12.8 million contract.
This is a sizable blow for the Warriors, who are currently the No. 1 seed in the West with an 11-3 record, but one they were involuntarily prepared for. They’ve been playing a very deep rotation of players with multiple options for multi-positional swingmen.
Lindy Waters will be starting now, but Kerr could easily rely on Brandin Podziemski, Moses Moody, or Buddy Hield in that spot as well.
Regardless, Melton was easily the best defender of the lot and his competent shooting ability along with his on-ball skills made him the ideal two-guard next to Curry in the starters unit.
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