After 13 seasons with the Golden State Warriors, Klay Thompson is departing for the Dallas Mavericks. A half of the famed ‘Splash Brothers' with Stephen Curry, Thompson helped Golden State win four championships in an eight-year span, but there may be some harsh feelings as the two sides part ways. And according to at least one former NBA player, the Warriors are more to blame for the breakup than Thompson.
Although the Warriors reportedly offered Thompson a two-year, $48 million contract last offseason, which carried a higher average annual salary but a shorter term than the three-year, $50 million contract he signed with the Mavericks, former NBA player Kenyon Martin, who played 15 seasons in the league, said on Gil's Arena podcast, the Warriors disrespected Thompson.
“You paid Draymond [Green]…I'm a bucket, I've averaged more points than him, we don't do none of this without me. I fought through all this to get back here and help us win again, and this is the motherf—ing thanks I get?” Martin said of what he thinks Thompson's mentality was in negotiations with Golden State. “It's a slap in the face, man. Very disrespectful. And like [Gilbert Arenas] said, certain guys with certain organizations, it's never a negotiation. It should never be about that. It shouldn't be about the money because what I've helped bring in, it ain't nowhere near what I'm asking for. It's foul on the Golden State Warriors' behalf.”
Warriors core breaking up after Klay Thompson's departure
At one time, the Golden State Warriors were the pinnacle of the NBA. By winning championships in 2015, 2017, 2018, and 2022, the Warriors core of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green cemented themselves as all-time greats that forever changed how the game was played.
However, the last two seasons have been anything but easy for Golden State. Just months after winning a championship, Green punched then-teammate Jordan Poole in the face during a preseason practice, earning criticism and a short suspension from the team. And while Green eventually returned and the Warriors tried to win their fifth title in nine years, the team proved to be wildly inconsistent, evident by possessing one of the worst away records and best home records in the NBA.
The Warriors eventually finished with the sixth seed in the Western Conference and triumphed over the Sacramento Kings in Game 7 in the first round behind a 50-point effort from Curry, but another postseason meeting with LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers ended in disappointment, as the Lakers won the second-round series 4-2. Unbeknownst to many at the time, but the Game 6 road defeat against the Lakers would prove to be the last playoff game together for Green, Thompson, and Curry on the Warriors.
While a better road team in 2023-24, the Warriors' problems were evident. Thompson appeared to decline and spoke on multiple occasions about how difficult he found it to accept he was not the same player he was before suffering back-to-back catastrophic leg injuries in 2019 and 2020. Additionally, Warriors head coach Steve Kerr began to replace Thompson in the starting lineup with rookie Brandin Podziemski, which may have led to Thompson feeling alienated considering he had started every game he had played since his rookie season.
Thompson's exit was reported as a possibility; he earned $43.2 million in the final season of a five-year, $189.9 million contract that the Warriors signed him to a month after he tore his ACL in the 2019 NBA Finals. While the deal was seen as a good-faith gesture as Thompson began his long road back to the NBA, which was made even longer by a torn Achilles tendon in late 2020, the struggles of the past two seasons for the team and Thompson appear to have led to the end of the Warriors core.
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