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Bold Warriors Predictions for Top 2023 NBA Offseason Signings, Trades – Bleacher Report
The Golden State Warriors had one objective for the 2023 NBA offseason: Re-sign Draymond Green.
They not only checked that box, but they also perhaps found a solution to their years-long problem of getting cooked without Stephen Curry by acquiring Chris Paul (in a deal that also allowed them to jettison Jordan Poole and the $128 million he’ll collect over the next four seasons).
The Dubs further beefed up their bench in the draft (Brandin Podziemski and Trayce Jackson-Davis) and in free agency (Cory Joseph and Dario Šarić).
It should go down as a productive summer—at least in the short term—but what can the Warriors expect from the team’s offseason investments? We’ll examine the possibilities with three bold predictions around notable players signed or acquired this offseason.
With his 33rd birthday behind him, Draymond Green should, in theory, be entering or advancing through his decline.
If he is, though, you wouldn’t know it by his defense.
With so much of his value on that end tied to his intelligence—one of the few basketball traits that ages like wine—he remains an elite presence.
This past season, he collected his third consecutive All-Defensive selection (the eighth of his career) and posted some absurd advanced metrics, like landing in the 99th percentile for defensive estimated plus/minus, per Dunks & Threes, and tying for sixth overall in Defensive RAPTOR, per FiveThirtyEight.
His defensive challenges could increase as Golden State’s roster gets older and slower, but that would only add to the impressiveness if he’s able to hold things together on that end.
Should Green lead the Dubs near the top five in defensive efficiency—they were 14th in 2022-23, per NBA.com—that could be the kind of achievement that delivers his second Defensive Player of the Year award.
Projecting just about anything related to Chris Paul feels almost impossible.
It’s simply too early to tell what role he’ll play (and for how long) and how much the Warriors will adjust their offensive approach to accommodate his pick-and-roll acumen. Never mind guessing how the aging process will impact him at the age of 38.
Still, if you had to bank on one thing happening, it’s probably an uptick in three-point shooting. Paul has shared the floor with other greats before, but he’s never played alongside a pair of playmakers like Stephen Curry and Draymond Green. If he buys into more of an off-ball role, at least when those two are on the floor, he might get served open shots buffet-style.
That, in turn, could help the career 36.9 percent three-point shooter push his splash rate north of 40 percent, a mark he’s only hit twice (2009-10 and 2016-17). If he’s getting a steady diet of spot-up chances, though, his stroke is good enough to knock them down consistently. Last season, he converted a whopping 52.3 percent of his catch-and-shoot threes, per NBA.com.
As a 29-year-old who has posted career lows in his last two healthy seasons—he missed the 2021-22 campaign due to a torn ACL—Dario Šarić isn’t the kind of addition that will automatically excite fans.
Well, we’d advise the Golden State crowd to get downright giddy about his arrival, as he seems like a hand-in-glove fit for this offense.
Šarić is a 6’10” floor-spacer (39.1 percent from three last season) who can handle, distribute and make quick decisions. And if he has his legs back under him after finding his form over the course of last season—he looked great after his deadline trade to the Oklahoma City Thunder—he just might hit some statistical marks he has never previously reached.
They probably won’t be gaudy numbers, because his role simply won’t be big enough, but this free-flowing offense could be just what he needs to top his personal bests in assists (2.6 per game, set in 2016-17) and three-point percentage (39.3 percent, 2017-18).