The Warriors led Memphis by 12 with 3:47 left on Friday and lost by three. Afterward, Stephen Curry said he would “probably” sit Saturday’s game in Phoenix, per Anthony Slater of ESPN, who noted it is clear the team is easing him into the season. At 0-2, with Brandin Podziemski also out, the fair question is whether this is the night to stop being careful. It isn’t.
The Roster Makes a Case for Playing
The argument for playing Curry is mostly about who else is available. Jimmy Butler is out after tearing the ACL in his right knee on Jan. 19 and having it repaired on Feb. 9, and Moses Moody is recovering from surgery on a torn left patellar tendon. Kristaps Porziņģis is also unavailable. Podziemski ruled himself out after aggravating the back soreness that kept him out of the opener.
That leaves the scoring to De’Anthony Melton and rookie Yaxel Lendeborg, who had 18 points, 13 rebounds and six assists Friday. Curry, meanwhile, looks like he has plenty left. He scored 23 points in 21 minutes in the opener, then put up 24 against Memphis while converting all 11 of his free-throw attempts.
The schedule gives this side its best argument. Kerr has said the team will manage the workloads of Curry and other veterans and that some of them will not play both games of back-to-back sets. Golden State has 15 back-to-backs. If Curry sits the second night of most of them, that adds up to a real number of games for a team that just lost two very winnable ones.
The Plan Was Built for Exactly This Night
The other side is stronger, and the facts behind it are ones the Warriors put on the record themselves. Curry turned 38 in March and is entering his 18th NBA season, all with Golden State. He missed 39 games last season, with his right knee a major factor.
In camp, Kerr told Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area that the staff was “purposely” holding Curry back “this year, trying to lessen the load with the knee in mind in particular.”
This rest night shouldn’t surprise anyone, because Kerr more or less announced it. The published 2026-27 schedule put the home opener at the front of the first of 15 back-to-back sets, with a game at Phoenix the following night. A plan that holds only until the team loses a couple of games isn’t much of a plan.
Recent history points the same way. On Sunday, Oct. 18, Curry appeared to slip and tweaked his right ankle at the Warriors’ open scrimmage, then limped off to the locker room. He was cleared and has played both games since. Still, three games in four days on the heels of that scare is the kind of stretch the Warriors said they wanted to avoid.
Friday’s loss also says little about Curry’s value in Phoenix. Golden State missed its last nine field-goal attempts. Its problem in that game was closing it out, not a lack of talent, and one road game without its two lead guards won’t fix or expose that.
Curry Should Sit
Curry should sit, and the Warriors should accept a likely 0-3 start without second-guessing the decision. A loss in late October costs one game in the standings. Last season, losing Curry cost them 39 games, and the reason they gave for holding him back this fall was to avoid repeating that.
The 15-back-to-back point deserves an answer, but this isn’t the night that answers it. Kerr said the staff had not yet identified specific games for Curry, Draymond Green or Al Horford to sit, so a skip-every-second-night rule hasn’t been set.
The real test of the policy is the next set, on Nov. 1-2. By then Curry will be two weeks past the ankle scare, and the Warriors will have to show whether resting him is a rule or something they decide game by game. Phoenix, four days into the season, doesn’t settle that.
Sources: Anthony Slater (ESPN), Monte Poole (NBC Sports Bay Area), Luca Evans (San Francisco Chronicle)
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