SAN FRANCISCO - The Warriors traditionally approach NBA trade deadlines with a specific philosophy. If scanning the roster results in a frown, grab the phone and start calling. If it inspires confidence, keep an eye on the phone.
With the Warriors sitting at 39-13 - the second best record in the league - a week before the February 10 deadline, Bob Myers expressed confidence.
"I don't think we feel the urgency," he said on Thursday. "But we're always listening and talking. If anything comes up we'll see."
That approach was last used in 2018-19, the most recent season in which the Warriors were in the running for the championship. He made no trades, opting to add emergency center Andrew Bogut to the team that reached the NBA Finals.
It was the last of the three seasons Kevin Durant spent on the roster, and the Warriors slept through all of those timelines—just like they did the two seasons before KD's arrival in July 2016. Five years, not a time frame trade.
It was the right call, as they reached the NBA Finals each season.
As a borderline playoff team last season, the Warriors made low-impact deals, drafting substitutes and trading backup guard Brad Wanamaker and backup center marquee Chris for cash. He didn't see any carrots to chase.
The previous season, in which the injury-prone Warriors posted the third-worst record in their Bay Area history, was hyperactive. He saw an opportunity to cement his future and landed six players in three different trades, in turn receiving 24-year-old Andrew Wiggins and a lottery pick that allowed him to draft Jonathan Cumming.
This season, however, the most likely deadline are already on the roster: Drummond Green, Andre Iguodala and James Wiseman. All three are dormant but are expected to return in the coming weeks.
"If I was being told, 'Don't count on Draymond coming back,' we would have reacted differently," Myers said. "If I were being told, 'James isn't coming back,' we would look at the deadline differently. Since I'm not being told that asterisk for everything . . . we can only react to that information." What we have tonight and tomorrow night and next night.
“Based on the information we have right now, we are being told that we should have a healthy team – based on the injured people right now. And we have to factor that into our decisions.”
With almost two-thirds of the season behind them, the Warriors have yet to play with full rotation. Klay Thompson missed the first half of the season. Wiseman has not played the 39th match of his career since last April. Iguodala has missed most of the season, but looks like he's close to a comeback. Green has missed the past three weeks and is expected to return in early March.
The truth is, warriors have no idea how good they will be if someday the injury list is empty.
Myers said, "As far as how we stack up, or how good we can be, or what our roof is, I don't think anyone can say that, because we haven't played those guys together. have seen." "We have an idea of what it could be. If the question is, have we seen enough to pat? Yes and no. If something happened that was so good, that we thought was better than our current version If so, we will do it. But as far as the pressure and mindset of this thing is not good enough, we don't feel that way.