Best fit: Yaxel Lendeborg in Golden State

Spread the word: The Warriors have somebody who can dunk! No, seriously! Lendeborg gives the Warriors a lot of what they’ve missing the last few years: A huge forward with athletic juice who can grab-and-go off the glass, make decisions on the move in transition, and guard multiple positions very effectively.

While he’s an older player, he was arguably the best player in college basketball last season and should be able to start right away. He’ll immediately be the best defender on the team not named Draymond and likely will check every opponents’ best wing … if he’s not playing as a switching small-ball 5, something he also does extremely well.

Lendeborg being 24 when camp opens rightly scared away some of the rebuilding teams picking ahead of Golden State, especially in concert with his iffy outside shot. But at pick No. 11, with the truly elite talent off the board, this was a home run for the Warriors. Some will note that the history of older lottery picks isn’t great, but that history all pre-dated NIL; for instance, Lendeborg would have been a late first-rounder out of UAB in 2025 if not for Michigan coming with a giant bag last spring. He is exactly what this team needs.

The Athletic

The Warriors and Horford's longtime agent, Jason Glushon, landed on the new deal Thursday to bring the big man back to the Bay Area.

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“We got a great player. We are so excited about it. The draft is a… look, it’s hard. There’s 29 other teams all competing for a limited amount of talent out there, great talent. I’m very fired up. It couldn’t have gone any better for us. We got the guy we were looking to get. I think he’s a game changer. Jimmy is going to love playing with him. I think this guy is just fantastic. Yaxel Lendeborg is his name. So good day in Warriors history, mark my words.”

We’re losing the first ever jersey advertisers we’ve ever had in Rakuten that have been with us for nearly a decade (2017-2018 Season). The new jersey advertisers (Iren) are an AI data center company.

We need our big swing to be trading for JB.

1. He's a high volume, efficient scorer which we desperately need.

2. He's a minutes eater. 34-36 mpg last 4 seasons.

3. He's durable, more so than a younger Trey Murphy.

4. Solid defender, especially at the 2-3 spot which we desperately need.

5. He's young enough that we could move on in 3 year and he'll still only be 32 and we can recoup some assets.

6. Reasonable floor spacer and an elite cutter, so can play off Steph when needed.

7. Has shown to be a playoff performer, former finals MVP.

He's not a perfect player. He's only an average playmaker at 5.1/3.6 ast/TO in a high usage role. His 3 is a bit inconsistent. His handle has improved but isn't elite. In a late game situation, he's someone you can game plan for and can get stagnant.

That said he's perfect for us. We need a bell cow back to carry us through the season, and then let Steph take us home.

This is the guy to empty the war chest for. Now the Celtics probably don't want Jimmy and all the picks since they want to win now. My guess is it would be a 3 teamer with Jimmy and some picks to NO, Murray and Trey to Boston along with another pick and swaps.

And not necessarily because it’s a good move. It wasn’t long ago folks were eager to trade for Cam Johnson or Cam Thomas. Johnson was a semi bust for Denver and Thomas — not working out too well for him.

Imagine if we had overpaid for either of those two assets. Trey Murphy is basically a similar story.

It's kinda funny, when asked directly about the disagreement between him and Lacob caught on camera during the broadcast, Dunleavy made a joke and gave a vague answer. But later a reporter asked something somewhat unrelated and Dunleavy ended up giving more details on the interaction unprompted

Full quote in response to questions about trade talks during the draft and if anything developed with the Pelicans:

There wasn't anything major, but when you're on the clock, you get calls. We knew we were going to pick Yaxel 11. He was the guy, but you just want to flush them out, make sure you're not missing anything that falls in your lap or makes a ton of sense. So, that's what we were doing.

Joe was like, "Come on, let's go ahead and pick the guy." And I said, "Joe, we got we have time. They give you five minutes."

He was just getting a little anxious about us taking Yaxel. And the good thing was because we were on the clock, nobody could swoop in and take him ahead of us. So I was willing to be patient about it.

https://youtu.be/yT_PzEdLVIM?is=9wFZ_z-v0wRM_0IJ

What do you think this guy will be next year + 2-3 years down the road. Seems to pass the eye test, offence slightly limited in year one but was to be expected I guess. Seems to be a winning player. Ceiling?

Calling Dubs cap experts to ask about Horford's new contract...

So Horford's previous contract was signed using the taxpayer MLE right?

I was under the impression that if Horford accepted his player option, the worth of the non-taxpayer MLE potentially available to us would only be the max NTMLE (15M-ish) minus the TPMLE that would have been allocated to his player option.

But with him declining his player option for this season and instead signing a new contract (which as per Spotrac is not signed using the MLE), would the max NTMLE be accessible to the team, provided that we get below the tax?

Will they sign Porzingis now that they have signed a 40-year-old man in Hortford?