It's not a coincidence that in the four championships the Golden State Warriors have on in the past decade, Andre Iguodala was present. Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green will take all the acclaim, and heck, even Andrew Wiggins stormed into the picture after his emergence in the 2022 NBA Finals squaring up against Jayson Tatum and the Boston Celtics. But Iguodala is now 38-years old, yet to decide whether he would be returning for his 19th season in the league.
However, according to Anthony Slater of The Athletic, the Warriors are pulling out all the stops to convince Iguodala to return. And it's franchise pillar Stephen Curry and head coach Steve Kerr who know just how valuable Iguodala is despite his waning contributions on the court.
Slater wrote, “Kerr and Curry, the two who know the inter-workings of a successful Warriors team better than just about anyone, hold a clear belief that having Iguodala fill a roster spot — even if he doesn’t play a minute — provides far more winning value than anybody else they can find on the minimum.”
Iguodala's basketball smarts will allow him to remain a solid, if limited, contributor should he decide to return for another year, and both Curry and Kerr know that the intangibles Iguodala possesses is irreplaceable, a vital part of the Warriors' winning culture since his arrival in the Bay back in 2013.
Iguodala played only 31 games for the Warriors in the regular season and seven more in the playoffs, but he played an integral part in some of their biggest wins of the season, proving he has something left in the tank aside from his renowned locker room presence and mentorship over the Warriors' young guys like Wiggins, Jordan Poole, and Jonathan Kuminga.
“They’ve dumbed down the game a lot,” Iguodala told Slater last March. “So even if the body’s not where I want it to be, I can exist out there without being a liability to the team.”
Andre Iguodala is set to announce his decision in a future episode of his Point Forward podcast, which will be required listening for Warriors faithful. The 2015 Finals MVP means so much to such a successful franchise, and if it's serial winners Stephen Curry and Steve Kerr advocating for your services, it might be too difficult an opportunity to turn down.
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