Joe Lacob and Bob Myers made their stance abundantly clear throughout the offseason. Despite the onerous financial realities of giving big-money contracts to Jordan Poole, Draymond Green and Andrew Wiggins, the Golden State Warriors indeed want to retain all three of those prospective free agents going forward. Once push comes to shove, though, Golden State's power brokers consistently maintained they may be forced to part ways with at least one of the impact players who proved indispensable on the Warriors' run to a fourth title in eight seasons.

“I don’t know that we win a championship last year if you take any of them away. Draymond, his pedigree here, he’ll go down as one of the best Warriors ever to put on a uniform,” Myers told Tim Kawakami of The Athletic in mid-September. “So we know the value of all those guys. Too early for me to say what will happen or won’t happen. But the goal is to keep those guys, all three of them, as long as we can. But again, there’s financial components.”

Much has changed for the defending champions since then. But what remains unclear for Golden State is its plan of attack with Green and Wiggins in wake of Poole re-upping Saturday on a four-year, $140 million extension that falls just below the max.

It's impossible to separate the timing and terms of Poole's new deal from the vicious punch Green landed to his left jaw last week. He was always at the top of the Warriors' extension pecking order, but undoubtedly gained additional leverage after the incident with Green and his stoic response to it both on and off the floor. Poole could've let fallout from Green's right hook fester and no one would've blamed him. Instead, Poole's sense of cool and calm served as the driving force behind countless discussions between he, Green and other team leaders that have made the perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate's return seamless—so far.

There's still a chance the incident takes Golden State's title defense off the rails. Whether or not that unfortunate development comes to pass won't be the only factor informing Green's future in the Bay, though.

Myers said last month that directly allowing for Green's departure weren't words he could get “out of my mouth.” Do he, Lacob and Steve Kerr feel the same way following the most serious internal transgression of a career increasingly marked by them?

Green, for his part, is fixated on helping the Warriors move past the altercation, keeping their sights firmly on winning back-to-back titles. Like he admitted at Media Day, the likelihood that Green plays 2022-23 without receiving an extension isn't his choosing anyway. Don't forget about his $27.5 million player option for next season, either.

“It is what it is. Again, quite frankly, I have two years left on my deal and that's my focus, how I'm going to complete those two years,” Green said on Thursday after his practice back with Golden State. “In saying that, yes, I do have an option at the end of this year. I have pretty great representation that made sure I had an option for the next year. When it's time to make that decision then I'll stand in front of it and whatever decision I make is the decision that I make, and I'll speak on it and answer whatever question about it. But if I'm not the one making the decision then that's not for me to stand in front of.”

It's extremely tough to imagine Golden State letting Wiggins walk next summer.

He was their second-best player throughout the playoffs, at times out-dueling the likes of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown as the Larry O'Brien Trophy hung in the balance. Wiggins plays the most valuable position in the league, and at 27, is a natural bridge between the Warriors' old guard and next generation. There's a chance he reaches terms on an extension paying slightly less than his current $33.6 million during the regular season.

That will not prove the case for Green. He's far more valuable to Golden State than any other team in the league due to the gravity of his offensive limitations, bound to be exacerbated playing without Curry. Teams that might've had interest regardless due to Green's otherworldly defensive ability and time-honored leadership traits could be scared off by his punch to Poole.

If Draymond Green can't be relied on to set a hard-edged tone of effort and accountability, his value league-wide will be even lower. There's just no reason for the Warriors to be rushed into paying him.

Poole's extension vaults Golden State's committed salary well past the projected luxury tax for 2023-24 even before accounting for Wiggins' new deal. A modest $30 million payday for Wiggins next season would push the Warriors' committed salary to about $218 million if Green picks up his player option, and that's before accounting for at least one veteran minimum addition. Golden State's repeater tax bill in that scenario? More than $290 million, which combined with that guaranteed salary amount far eclipses the $400 million line Lacob drew in the sand for total payroll over the summer.

Taking Green's $27.5 million player option out of the equation altogether would save the Warriors over $170 million in tax payouts next season. As tempting as that may be for Lacob, parting ways with Green would leave Golden State without the defensive trump card who's been a driver of its ongoing dynasty.

Kuminga flashed high-level playmaking chops in Friday's preseason finale and projects as a potentially elite on-ball defender, but will never be the additive force Draymond Green is at his best. Though Kevon Looney has worked himself into providing a reasonable facsimile of Green's impact, he's not that type of all-court, two-way playmaker. Letting Green go and committing to James Wiseman whole hog would pull at the Warriors' very fabric.

Lacob and Myers didn't choose their words by accident when copping to realities of Golden State's payroll this summer. Something has to give for the Warriors to bring back Poole, Green and Wiggins, and Wiseman's rapid development since training camp tipped off lessens the long-shot possibility of him being moved in a salary dump. Maybe Klay Thompson really will take a sizable paycut on his next contract, but that won't ease Golden State's tax bill until 2024-25.

Poole's extension, basically, doesn't change anything for Draymond Green. Age always suggested he was more likely to be a cap casualty than Poole or Wiggins, and those chances inevitably increased after the punch. The best-case scenario for the Warriors involves Green opting out of his contract for next season, then re-signing on a cheaper deal that accounts for his status as a non-shooting thirtysomething who forever lost a dose of his team's trust last week. Even that alternative, implausible timeline of a $10 million haircut for Green wouldn't be enough to keep Golden State's total payroll from shooting past $400 million.

“It's going to be really difficult. I’m not going to sit here and lie to the fan base,” Lacob told The Athletic in July. “It’s going to be really difficult to figure out what we’ll do next summer.”

At least the Warriors have a full season of defending their championship to manage that challenge.

[Tim Kawakami, The Athletic]