Леброн Жэймс Филадельфи 76ерс багийг сонгосноор Голдэн Стэйт Уорриорс шинэ сорилттой нүүр туллаа

The Golden State Warriors have been one of the NBA’s marquee franchises for more than a decade. But with news of LeBron James’ decision to join the Philadelphia 76ers on Friday reverberating around the league, the cold reality of next season is hitting the Warriors and their fan base.

Golden State was considered one of the front-runners to obtain James’ services, along with the 76ers, Cleveland Cavaliers, Miami Heat and Minnesota Timberwolves. The Warriors weren’t under any illusion that James was definitely going to come to the Bay, though they held out hope it would happen. Without him, the Warriors will still be interesting, thanks in large part to Stephen Curry and the excitement his game continues to generate at 38 years old. But for the first time in years, they will start a season without realistic championship expectations.

The upcoming 2026-27 campaign has a similar feel to the start of the 2019-20 campaign. Klay Thompson got hurt in Game 6 of the 2019 NBA Finals and missed the following season as he recovered from a torn ACL. (He also missed the 2020-2021 season while recovering from an Achilles injury.) Kevin Durant left the Warriors after three seasons and signed with the Brooklyn Nets. Curry broke his hand in the fourth game of the season and missed four months. The Warriors finished with a league-worst 15-50 record in the COVID-19-shortened season and landed the No. 2 pick in the 2020 draft. They selected James Wiseman, who played two and a half seasons for the organization before getting traded and is no longer in the league.

This iteration of the Warriors doesn’t figure to be nearly that bad. Curry is still at the top of his game even as he deals with a lingering knee issue that sidelined him for two months last season. The Warriors have more talent behind him than they did entering that season in the form of young players such as Brandin Podziemski, Gui Santos and promising rookie forward Yaxel Lendeborg. They have proven veterans such as Al Horford, Kristaps Porziņģis, and, if they get a new deal done, Draymond Green.

The problem for the Warriors, as it was nearly seven years ago, is that they walk into a new year waiting on a core piece to rehab from a career-altering injury. Last time, it was Thompson; this time, it’s veteran forward Jimmy Butler (torn ACL) and swingman Moses Moody (torn patellar tendon), who will miss big chunks of next season.

Championship expectations have defined the Steve Kerr era. After much debate, the longtime coach ultimately re-signed with the team he’s been leading for the last 12 seasons. He still has a passion for what he does, and he still enjoys the day-to-day process that comes with coaching Curry and company. But Kerr will have a challenge this season keeping his veteran players engaged day to day. They’ll have their moments where they come together and win some games, and Curry will still show that he’s one of the best players in the game when he’s healthy, but the Warriors don’t have enough talent to play for the only thing they have judged themselves on every year since Kerr took over as coach.

After the Warriors’ season ended with a Play-In Tournament loss in April to the Phoenix Suns, Curry acknowledged that the Warriors needed to change their way of thinking to get back on track. In 2019, they were coming off their fifth straight finals appearance. In 2026, they’re coming off a 37-45 campaign in which they finished 10th in the Western Conference.

“I think we can reshape the narrative,” Curry said at the time. “Knowing in the back of our mind that is the ultimate goal, but we have to get back to the basics of what makes a good basketball team, a competitive basketball team every single night. Realize how hard it is to win in this league, but can we rethink how we do things with the foundation we’ve established? We don’t have to keep saying championship, championship, championship every day even though we’ve experienced that. It’s, can we just build the foundation again with what this team needs to do? … We have to put everything on the drawing board to get back to just being competitive every single night.”

That’s the tricky balance Warriors GM Mike Dunleavy must navigate moving forward.

Curry has said repeatedly through the years that he only wants to play for one team, but he also doesn’t want to play for a bad team in the final years of his Hall of Fame career. On paper, the Warriors aren’t going to be bad next season; they’re just not going to be very good. Same as last season. At this stage, is Curry going to have the same amount of patience he’s had in years past if it becomes clear that the Warriors are headed for a similar fate that ended their season in April?

Curry aside, on a broader note, the Warriors re-signed veterans Horford, Porziņģis and De’Anthony Melton, but why keep them all season on a team that is badly in need of more youth and assets? If any of the three has a solid season, Dunleavy should be ready to move them if a contending team comes calling.

Some fans may not agree given how the season unfolded, but after a torrid end to 2024-25 once they acquired Butler and a second-round playoff exit in which Curry missed the final four games, the Warriors walked into last season believing that, if everything fell into place, they had the chance to contend for another title. It’s why the moves to bring in all three veterans could be explained at the time. That hope is gone now, and James’ decision only amplifies the fact that the Warriors need to focus on their future a lot more than their present.

If Curry wants to play out the final days of his extraordinary career in the Bay, the Warriors should roll out the red carpet for him every night. He has earned every dollar he’s made and has created a generation of fans that will stay loyal to the team even after he retires, the same way Michael Jordan did for the Chicago Bulls. Curry is entering the final year of his current max deal, which pays him over $63 million this season. He said at the end of last season that he’s open to a contract extension, one that the Warriors would be eligible to sign him to next month.

But as much as Warriors owner Joe Lacob feels indebted to Curry, the Warriors have to face the reality that this core’s best days are long behind them now. They shouldn’t be making moves to help them stay competitive now out of loyalty to Curry, because those moves might harm what they may be able to do long after he retires.

The chase for James offered a last chance at bringing light to the “fading dynasty” Kerr spoke about last season. If James thought the Warriors could still win one more title, he’d be headed to San Francisco, not Philadelphia.

Now that the light has faded, the Warriors need to go back to that drawing board Curry spoke about. They can still play a respectable brand of basketball and make sure that Curry can be proud of the effort his team is putting in every night within the culture that he helped build. But they can no longer walk into another season believing they have a chance at playing in the biggest games that matter.

That distinction likely happened a while ago, but James’ decision cemented it.