Warriors owner bemoans 'negativity' from fans

The Golden State Warriors haven't added a single veteran to a team that went 37-45 last season. Yet their owner can't understand the "negativity" of the fans.

Warriors owner Joe Lacob went on "The TK Show" to list the Warriors' offseason moves, telling Tim Kawakami, "I don’t understand what all the negativity is about." But it's never a good sign when an NBA owner is already defending his roster two months before the season begins.

Golden State Warriors went all-in on LeBron James

The Warriors had one primary off-season target: LeBron James. They hoped that living in the Bay Area and getting to play with his Olympic teammate Steph Curry and his good friend Draymond Green would be enough to sway James into signing with the veteran team.

Instead, James chose the Philadelphia 76ers, who had traded for Jaylen Brown and made other aggressive moves, as opposed to the Warriors, who merely re-signed many of last season's players.

Lacob acknowledged that "We did try to make a few moves that 29 other teams tried to make. Sometimes these moves work out, sometimes they don't." He may have been including the team's quixotic pursuit of Giannis Antetokounmpo in this statement, but the difference is that other teams had backup plans. It does not appear that the Warriors did.

Golden State Warriors walking delicate balance

On paper, the Warriors are simply not a championship contender, and arguably not even a projected playoff team. They still have Curry and Green from their four title teams, but the team has six players over 30 years old, plus two players in Jimmy Butler and Moses Moody who could miss large chunks of the season. They still need to fill two roster spots from an unexciting pool of remaining players.

What they do have is an enormous amount of salary cap space for next summer, depending on how much the team gives Curry in his expected contract extension this year. Lacob and the Warriors don't want to tell season ticket buyers that they're waiting a year to make big moves, but all of their moves this summer — Draymond Green's one-year deal, Kristaps Porzingis' lightly-guaranteed deal for 2027-28 — suggest a large revamp is coming.

It's not negativity coming from Warriors fans. It's realism. The Warriors owner may not be able to say it publicly, but it's hard to imagine Lacob is truly optimistic about the upcoming season.