Warriors owner, GM appeared to have disagreement on live feed during NBA Draft

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Warriors owner, GM appeared to have disagreement on live feed during NBA Draft

Originally posted on Larry Brown Sports
By Renzo Pocholo Salao | Last updated Jun 24, 2026 5:47 PM ET

The camera may have caught the Golden State Warriors’ brain trust at a bad time during Tuesday’s NBA Draft.

The Warriors were on the clock for the No. 11 pick in the 2026 NBA draft held at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. As is customary on such a broadcast, ESPN flashed to Golden State’s war room just as the team was about to send in its pick.

The live feed showed Warriors owner Joe Lacob in an animated discussion with general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. while standing inside the team’s draft headquarters at Chase Center in San Francisco, California.

While the feed didn’t have any audio, the hand gestures seemed to show the two in disagreement right before Dunleavy called in the Warriors’ pick.

Warriors owner Joe Lacob and GM Mike Dunleavy appear to disagree on what to do with the pick pic.twitter.com/LGKd0hvQav
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) June 24, 2026

Lacob and Dunleavy could have potentially just been very passionate about making the pick, which turned out to be Michigan forward Yaxel Lendeborg. But the mood in the Warriors’ draft HQ stood in stark contrast to that of some other teams, which looked much more celebratory than argumentative.

Given the Warriors’ win-now approach with Steph Curry still on the team, Lendeborg was hardly a surprising selection. Standing at 6’9″ and weighing 241 pounds, the 23-year-old Lendeborg already has the physical profile to compete in the NBA on Day 1.

Based on the seemingly testy exchange between Lacob and Dunleavy, perhaps the pick wasn’t as much of a no-brainer as most would have expected.

This article first appeared on Larry Brown Sports and was syndicated with permission.

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