Golden State will open camp in Hawaii without Kristaps Porzingis, and the team is not saying why.
The Warriors announced the 31-year-old center is out indefinitely with an undisclosed health issue. There is no timeline and no diagnosis made public.
The Vagueness Is the Story
General manager Mike Dunleavy did not have much. “He was in last week, doing well and everything,” Dunleavy said. “I don’t have a timeline on it.”
Steve Kerr called it surprising and compared it to what he described as a mysterious issue Porzingis dealt with in March. That is two unexplained absences inside seven months for a player the Warriors committed real money to.
Teams are allowed to protect medical privacy, and players are entitled to it. The practical effect is that Golden State’s frontcourt plan has a hole in it with no date attached.
What Golden State Paid For
Porzingis signed a two-year, $40 million deal in late June. The Warriors acquired him from Atlanta in February for Buddy Hield and Jonathan Kuminga.
Across both stops last season he played 32 games and averaged 16.7 points, 5.2 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 1.2 blocks, with 15 of those games in Golden State and 11 starts. The counting stats are fine. The availability is the issue, and it has been the issue since his time in Boston, where illness and calf problems cost him stretches of seasons.
The Warriors Need Him More Than They Admit
Golden State went 18-27 without Stephen Curry last season, and Curry missed 27 games. He says the knee is “feeling great, ready to go,” and he signed a two-year, $116 million extension.
Here is the math that should worry the Bay Area. A roster built around a 38-year-old guard who missed a third of last season now has its starting center out indefinitely before camp. Some projections already have the Warriors missing the playoffs, and that was before this.
Trade Chatter Has Already Started
Rival executives are reportedly circling Porzingis as a trade candidate. That is almost always what happens when a player on an expiring-adjacent deal has an unclear health picture, and it rarely goes anywhere until the player is on the floor and producing.
Nobody trades for a center who cannot be evaluated.
What to Watch
Golden State opens on Oct. 21 against the Lakers, which sits a day after the league’s opening night and has been reported inconsistently. Porzingis has not been ruled out of that game, which is less reassuring than it sounds given that nobody has ruled him in either.
The nature of the condition and the expected timeline remain unknown. Until the Warriors say more, the only honest read is that they do not know when he is coming back.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.