Can The Golden State Warriors Use The 2020 NBA Draft To Return To Championship Contention?

The Golden State Warriors enter next season with a single mission – to return to championship contention. After what has amounted to a sabbatical year for their main stars, the Warriors need to rebuild their surrounding talent to win another title before their core of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green age beyond their primes. The Warriors probably only have a two-to-three year window before that trio will need a lot more help. 

The NBA draft holds the key for the Warriors’ long-term plans. It is highly unlikely that the Warriors will have the salary cap space to sign a star, as they did with Kevin Durant, for the foreseeable future. On the other hand, Curry, Thompson, and Green were all drafted by the franchise. Over the next couple of years the Warriors will need to hit again to rebuild and extend their dynasty along the lines of the San Antonio Spurs. 

This year the Warriors should end up, unexpectedly, with a top-5 pick, in an interesting twist of fate that somewhat mirrors how the Spurs ended up with Tim Duncan. Unfortunately for the Warriors, the 2020 NBA draft does not contain a prospect like Duncan. But thanks to the Andrew Wiggins trade, the Warriors will have Minnesota’s 2021 top-3 protected first-round pick. That Minnesota pick is important because it potentially offers the Warriors a chance to get a young star in the 2021 NBA draft, which is expected to hold many more top-level prospects than the 2020 NBA draft.

The 2020 NBA draft is questionable at the top

This means the Warriors can focus on using this year’s pick to get a more NBA-ready prospect to help next season. Of the top three prospects, James Wiseman probably projects to have the most immediate impact thanks to his physical tools and the fairly simple offensive role he could play initially. On the other hand, Anthony Edwards’ potential may be intriguing for the Warriors if they buy that their vaunted culture can turn him into a winning player. 

The only player the Warriors should probably avoid from the rumored top three is LaMelo Ball. He undoubtedly has tremendous potential as a playmaker but the rest of his game is so underdeveloped it is difficult to imagine him having any positive impact in his rookie year, particularly in a high stakes playoff environment. Ball’s shot is fundamentally broken, and his shot selection is even worse. Meanwhile on defense, despite his length, his game has no discipline and poor fundamentals, gambling on everything. That might fly in the NBL, where he was second in the Australian league in steals, but in the NBA he will be exposed. Over two-to-three years, if everything breaks right, Ball may end up being the most talented player in the 2020 NBA draft, but the Warriors can’t afford to wait that long. They need help now. 

Nonetheless, all top three prospects have serious question marks, not just Ball. That doesn’t mean, however, that the 2020 NBA draft is a weak draft. While some have compared this year’s class to 2013, which still yielded Giannis Antetokounmpo, perhaps a more apt comparison is 2011. There was plenty of talent throughout the lottery and beyond that year, with Kyrie Irving at 1, Kemba Walker at 9, Thompson at 11 and Kawhi Leonard at 15, all the way down to Tobias Harris at 19 and Jimmy Butler at 30. In between there were several solid role players as well. The chances are there will be some stars in the 2020 NBA draft, it’s just not immediately clear who they might be.

3 NBA-ready options for the Warriors

The real question facing the Warriors is what do they need right now to help them contend next season? Positionally they could do with help across the board. They have no back-up guards they can count on with Shaun Livingston retired. Their wing depth is lacking with Durant and Andre Iguodala gone. And they could use another big man with Green entering his 30s and Kevon Looney’s uncertain health.

But what the Warriors really need are the sorts of players they’ve long coveted – versatile, two-way, playmaking, intelligent basketball players. To that end the position is much less important than the overall skillset. Crucially they need players they could throw into a playoff series starting next season. Here are three prospects who might fit that bill.

Name: Deni Avdija

Team: Maccabi Tel Aviv (Israel)

Position: Wing/ forward

Key stats (2019/20, per game): 19.8 minutes, 7.7 points, 4.1 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 0.5 steals, 0.6 blocks, 51.4 FG%, 33.6 3pt%, 52 FT%

Deni Avdija is a 6-foot-8 playmaking forward who fires full-court transition passes, leads the break, runs the pick-and-roll, and passes out of the post all with equal aplomb. Off-the-ball he’s still developing, with improving shooting albeit from a lower base, but his intelligence means he’s an effective cutter already.

Defensively Avidja is tough, versatile, and sees the floor well. He’s already a good help defender, and while he’s not super-athletic he’ll be fine at an NBA level. Overall, he’s got great feel and reads the game very well. 

Perhaps the biggest selling point for Avdija, and why he’s mooted as the top international prospect above promising guards like Killian Hayes, is that he’s likely to be one the most NBA-ready players available. He’s already playing important minutes in the EuroLeague, the highest level of club competition outside the NBA. His Maccabi Tel Aviv team were fifth in the EuroLeague at the time the season was suspended. Avdija is basically Warriors Coach Steve Kerr’s dream prospect – intelligent, versatile, and ready to play.

The big question mark is the shooting. He’s improved over the course of this season, but the free throw percentage is concerning for his prospects over the longer-term. Avdija will need to become a reliable shooter as he plays more off the ball, at least knocking down enough of the open shots he gets to keep defenses honest. However, his mechanics are clean, and as Chris Ebersole, the NBA’s Director of Elite Basketball Operations who is responsible for overseeing programs like Basketball Without Borders, told me last week, shooting percentages can vary as players transition to new roles at a pro level. 

A reasonable projection for Avdija’s NBA career might be to become a Danilo Gallinari-level player. They have different games — Gallinari is more of a shooter and Avdija more of a versatile playmaker — but somewhere around an above-average NBA starter at a premium position, with borderline All-Star potential, is definitely in range for Avdija. In an uncertain draft, that sounds like a pretty good outcome for the Warriors.

You can read a more in-depth assessment of Avdija in this interview with Ebersole.

Name: Obi Toppin

Team: Dayton

Position: Forward/ Center

Key stats (2019/20, per game): 31.6 minutes, 20 points, 7.5 rebounds, 2.2 assists, 1.0 steals, 1.2 blocks, 63.3 FG%, 39 3pt%, 70.2 FT%

The Warriors offensive system has variously utilized a combination of big men who can operate in the high-post in dribble hand-offs, hit the open cutter whether at the elbow or in the low-post, run the floor and provide vertical spacing, and stretch out defenses with their long-range shooting.

Toppin can do all of those things. He was the best basketball player in college basketball this year and is tailor-made for the Warriors’ offensive system. Indeed, it’s pretty easy to see how the Warriors with Toppin could have the top offense in the league next year. And while the cancellation of the NCAA tournament means scouts are missing out on seeing how he fares in that sort of competitive environment, his Dayton Flyers went 29-2, demonstrating the winning pedigree that the Warriors love. At 22-years-old Toppin’s not a kid either, meaning he should be able to plug in and play. 

As easy as it is to fall in love with what the Warriors could be offensively with Toppin, it’s just as easy to fall out of love with the fit defensively. At 6-foot-9 Toppin is a bit undersized for the center position, but he also lacks the lateral quickness to stay with wings and guards. He’s not going to be a good option for a defensive strategy based on switching everything. Toppin’s instincts, positioning, and footwork are also troubling too. For as athletic as he is on offense, throwing down incredible windmill dunks, his timing on shotblocking is not great. Some of these limitations, such as footwork and timing, may be able to be coached up. But the physical limitations, such as lateral quickness and his average length for the center spot, will have to be worked around. 

It is possible to conceive a strategy of using Toppin as a small-ball 5 trying to utilise his athleticism to block some shots while Green roams the floor disrupting everything he can find. But when the playoffs roll around, what will happen when Toppin gets switched onto James Harden or Lebron James repeatedly? 

Toppin’s most regularly used NBA comparison is the five-time All-NBA selection Amar’e Stoudemire, who was an absolute beast on those run-and-gun Phoenix Suns teams. Toppin is probably a better playmaker but at the same time is slightly less athletic. Nonetheless it’s a pretty good comparator, especially on the defensive end. Those Suns teams may have revolutionized the NBA but they were never good enough defensively to win an NBA title. 

That said, the Suns didn’t have a Draymond Green alongside Stoudemire. What the Warriors would need to work out is whether they could fashion a championship-level defense with Toppin on the floor. If the answer is yes, the offensive upside is tantalizing.

You can read a more in-depth assessment of Obi Toppin’s game from Forbes Sports draft analyst Zachary Cohen here. 

Name: Tyrese Haliburton

Team: Iowa State

Position: Guard

Key stats (2019/20, per game): 36.7 minutes, 15.2 points, 5.9 rebounds, 6.5 assists, 2.5 steals, 0.7 blocks, 50.4 FG%, 41.9 3pt%, 82.2 FT%

Tyrese Haliburton is a 6-foot-5 playmaking guard possessing great length, intelligence, and feel for the game. He’s a top-notch shooter and an excellent defender. He stuffs the stat sheet like nobody’s business. So what’s not to like?

Not much really. Haliburton’s on the thin side, which means that he’s sometimes not physical enough or aggressive enough getting into the paint, and might get pushed around a bit by stronger wings in the NBA. But that’s nothing some time in a weight room couldn’t fix and it’s not like the Warriors don’t have Eric Paschall to play bully ball when required in the interim. 

Haliburton’s shot mechanics are also pretty funky, with a slow release, but it sure goes into the basket an awful lot. He’s got tremendous touch both from long-range and the free-throw line. With a bit of tweaking to quicken up the release, he’ll be fine.

So it’s a bit puzzling to see him ranging anywhere from top-5 to outside the lottery. Haliburton may well be available to the Warriors a little lower down than some other prospects covered so far. Whether he’ll end up becoming a star or not is unknown, but Haliburton certainly projects as an elite role player, providing secondary playmaking, knocking down open shots, and covering multiple positions defensively in the NBA.

For the Warriors, he’d be a great fit. Think Shaun Livingston with a three-pointer instead of the post-turnaround and you’re not far off. If the Warriors are basically looking for a Livingston replacement, they won’t find better than Haliburton. The question is, can they trade down to get him, or are they willing to burn a top-5 pick for that?

You can read a more in-depth assessment of Tyrese Haliburton’s game from Forbes Sports draft analyst Zachary Cohen here. 

The Warriors can find a player in the 2020 Draft

The 2020 NBA draft may not have the standout star that you might expect to be able to select with a top-5 pick in a normal year. But between Edwards potential, Wiseman’s defensive tools, Avdija’s playmaking skills, Toppin’s NBA-ready offense, and Halliburton’s smarts and feel for the game on both ends, the Warriors should have plenty of options to find someone who can help them return to championship contention as early as next season.