The Warriors Are Counting On The Three Men Who Played The Most Minutes On A 37-45 Team

Brandin Podziemski played all 82 games for the Warriors last season and logged more minutes than anyone else on the roster. Will Richard played 69 of them as a rookie. Gui Santos played 68.

On Friday, Steve Kerr said the back end of his roster has to hold Golden State's season together until Jimmy Butler and Moses Moody come back.

Kerr spent part of the conversation explaining why the roster did not get younger. "Having been a GM, I know how hard it is to just magically say, 'All right, we're going to get younger,'" Kerr told Tom Tolbert on Friday. "We obviously tried to get younger, but stuff has to materialize. You have to have the assets or the cap room to be able to do certain things." Nothing on the market moved him. "There was nothing that made sense to me to make this huge move. So, look, we did the best we could to put together the roster."

Then he named the plan.

"I think our depth is the answer," Kerr said. "We're going to have to rely on our whole roster, including our two-way players at times. And fortunately, I do feel really good about the guys we have who have kind of filled out the back end of the roster. And I think they can help us hold down the fort until Jimmy and Moses get back the second half of the year."

That is a coach describing the first half of his season as a holding action. The men he is asking to hold it were already playing the most.

The back end of the roster led this team in minutes#

Golden State played 19,805 minutes last season and finished 37-45, tenth in the Western Conference. Here is where those minutes went, in order.

Podziemski played every game. Richard, a rookie, played 69 of 82 and started 21 of them. Santos played 68. Kerr named Podziemski and Santos on Friday, along with Yaxel Lendeborg, Georges Niang and Brandon Williams. He did not mention Richard, who finished fifth on the team in minutes in his first season. The three of them finished first, fourth and fifth.

The three of them were available for 219 of a possible 246 games, or 89.0 percent. Curry, Butler and Porzingis were available for 96 of the same 246, or 39.0 percent. The first group played 5,105 minutes and the second played 2,867.

So the depth was not a contingency last season. It was the arrangement. The club won 37 games with it.

The holding action is 47 games long#

Golden State's published schedule lists 80 regular-season games with dates. Forty are at home and forty are on the road, which is two short of a full 82. The list carries an eleven-day gap between December 1 and December 12.

Of the 80 that are dated, 47 fall on or before January 30. That is 58.8 percent of the schedule as published, and it includes 25 home games and 22 road games. The remaining 33 begin on February 1.

Kerr did not say when the second half starts, and neither has the club. What the calendar says is that a return on February 1 arrives with 33 of the 80 dated games still to play.

Neither man has a date#

Butler turns 37 on Monday, September 14. He tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee on January 19 and had it repaired on February 9. Moody ruptured the patellar tendon in his left knee on March 23, per the club's announcement, and had surgery five days later. Both are listed OUT on ESPN's Warriors injury table, and Golden State has not announced a return date for either.

The most specific reporting on Butler is Anthony Slater's at ESPN on September 9. Slater wrote that strength tests on the knee have shown notable progress, that Butler is expected to be limited to individual court and strength work when camp opens, and that he needs more time before he is cleared for contact. Slater called January or February an optimistic target, said there are checkpoints ahead of any clearance, and noted that Rick Celebrini, the club's lead medical decision-maker, is known for a cautious approach. Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area reported on September 4 that Butler is not expected back until the second half. Those two accounts overlap in February. Neither is a club timeline.

Poole reported the same day that Moody is not expected back until 2027.

Whose best case#

The club's best case is that Butler and Moody come back early and the holding action is short. That is not the best case for the men holding it. Every game Butler misses is a game of wing minutes for Richard and Santos, and Podziemski's 2,333 minutes last season were built on a roster where Curry played 43 games and Butler played 38. A healthier top of the roster is what Golden State wants, and it is the thing that takes minutes away from the three men who played the most of them last season.

Kerr told NBC Sports Bay Area on September 3 that the lineup he wants to look at in camp puts Yaxel Lendeborg, who has not played a regular-season NBA game, at small forward. Lendeborg, Georges Niang and Brandon Williams were all added this summer and all want minutes in the same part of the floor.

Camp opens on September 29 in Hawaii. Golden State opens the preseason on October 4 against the Clippers at the Stan Sheriff Center in Honolulu, opens the regular season on October 21 at the Lakers, and finishes on April 11 against Utah.

The roster Kerr described on Friday closely resembles the one he had last season, and he has said out loud that its depth is the plan rather than the fallback. Last season that same depth played the most minutes on the team, and the team lost 45 games.

Sources: Steve Kerr's remarks to the Tom Tolbert Show, reported by Angelina Martin, NBC Sports Bay Area, September 13. Games, starts and minutes from Basketball Reference's 2025-26 Golden State team page. Schedule and dates from the Warriors' team schedule at NBA.com. Injury status from ESPN's Golden State injury table. Butler's rehab reporting from Anthony Slater, ESPN, September 9; Monte Poole, NBC Sports Bay Area, September 4.