Preseason kickoff game preview
Starters will play limited minutes as new-look Warriors make debut
This is it, the Golden State Warriors are off to play some actual full contact basketball against another team. The 2025-2026 season comes with uncertainty, but it’s tough to say where the challenges will rank on the scale of recent memories. With the addition of Al Horford, and another season for Jimmy Butler, this roster could make some noise in the Western Conference.
But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. First up, this preseason opener against the Los Angeles Lakers will pit old rivals against each other - which always brings some extra heat up with the other players on the court.
Sure, the preseason games don’t count; but as the first real view of the team, insiders and outsiders will be closely watching for glimpses of greatness… or flashes of doom. DOOOM!
On that note, Jimmy Butler is likely out due to slightly tweaking his ankle in practice. Coach Steve Kerr otherwise promised around 15 minutes for the starters (unless he changes his mind). De’Anthony Melton is the other excused absence as he is still working himself back from the knee injury sustained last year.
GAME DETAILS
WHO: Golden State Warriors (0-0) vs. Los Angeles Lakers (0-0)
WHEN: Sunday, October 4th, 2025; 5:30pm PST
WATCH: ESPN; YouTubeTV
Strengths and weaknesses
“Experience is the best teacher,” as the old saying goes. And that’s the best way to summarize what I see as this teams greatest strength. Four of the five starters are all likely going to end up in the Hall of Fame, and though the knees may all be on the decline,1 the heads at the very top of those eight lower leg joints are absolutely brilliant.
Hard to call this under-reported, but the Warriors have managed to execute a relatively sly pivot towards players with savant-level basketball IQs. Back when I first started covering this team for Golden State of Mind, I was lucky enough to sit down with one of the coaches after a practice2 and his answer to my question about what the team is specifically looking for in 10-20 minutes of a practice or preseason game.
“They’ve got to do three things: dribble, pass, and shoot.”
But now, it seems like that simplified rubric has been enhanced. The Warriors have core players that are almost prescient when it comes to making basketball plays. Importantly, these are all two-way players. Dribble, pass, and shoot? In their sleep!
This at least partially solves one of the more jarring immersion-breaking problems of the entire run. Certainly, there will still be moments where fans are screaming against whatever the modern equivalent of “DON’T PUT FESTUS BACK IN!!” will be this season, but this veteran core will ensure the impact of those moments is limited.
It’s a strength that isn’t just limited to the starters. A positive feedback loop of hoopers knowing how to hoop, feeding other guys that can operate under a simpler decision tree of making cuts or screens around the main actions. I can imagine coach Steve Kerr, up late (or early, whatever, we don’t judge where your creative window is) smiling wistfully while fiddling around with play design options.
According to comments from his trainer, the new wrinkle to Curry’s off-season workout was a renewed focus on the midrange game.
He’s going to play that midrange game with his back to the basket
That’s one of those “iceberg” comments, where most of the substance is under the water. In this case, what we aren’t talking about is just how distinctly different the play style is when it’s time to call a play for Jimmy Butler. After playing most of his career in a pace-and-space offense, Curry knows that Kerr’s coaching staff has been furiously scribbling on those clipboards that look like a mini basketball court.
Having a system so deeply entrenched as the one the Warriors have been operating under Kerr is a double edged sword. Sure, the players are deeply familiar with the core concepts by now and are easily able to adjust to new wrinkles - but the same holds true for the other team’s defense. Through Curry, Kerr forced the entire NBA to rethink how to defend shooters - how to think about ways to continue getting Curry into a threat position. Now though, there’s a layered stack of plans and counter plans deployed across the league. No one is surprised anymore. Curry’s skills are still nearly impossible to defend against, but the system is running on outdated floppy disks.
New wrinkles this season are going to be about the new faces. Horford is a stretch center, solid rebounder, defender… he figured out how to dribble pass and shoot a while ago. But if Curry’s new off-season priority is to be believed, Golden State is going to be hunting in some new territory. Curry in the midrange is the embodiment of the cliche “take what the defense gives you” - but it’s probably more about freeing up some edges for folks like Butler and Kuminga to shine. You need some space to break free. There are all sorts of examples of really nice off-ball cuts that are missed because of angles or whatever, and now, in their second season together, Curry and Butler are going to hone their two-man game.
For this game, we only get about 15 minutes of the main act. Mostly, this game will be about watching the supporting cast… actually that’s incorrect. Mostly, this game is about the fact that we are entering another year where we are all fortunate enough to watch the Warriors.
Prediction
Typed partially on my phone in a dark concert venue, so please excuse any typos today - of which there are sure to be a few above.
I’ll be in house tonight. Say hi and I’ll buy you a beer.
Curry (37), Butler (36), Green (35) and Horford (39) are not young, by NBA standards.
I looked for this interview but couldn’t find it. Looks like some of my old author pages were finally put out to pasture by Vox and it’s not worth wading through to find manually. One of the Kerr scions. Nice guy. I think the article ended up mostly being about some center who was trying to make a comeback after off-court challenges.