Golden State Warriors small forward Harrison Barnes will hit free agency after the NBA Finals, and he wants to stay with the Warriors. However, with the Warriors gearing up to make a run at Kevin Durant, he knows that may not happen. From Scott Howard-Cooper of NBA.com:
That the Warriors want to be at the front of the line if Durant considers leaving Oklahoma City as a free agent has been a poorly kept secret since early in the regular season. Of course, a lot of teams want to to be in that spot. The difference is a lot of teams won’t have at least one championship and two straight trips to the Finals in the bag, not to mention the most regular-season wins in NBA history.
Golden State management would love the opportunity to consider breaking up a back-to-back champion, and the players know it.
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Durant doesn’t even have to end up in Oakland as a free agent — either this summer or in 2017 should he choose to take a short-term deal in Oklahoma City and defer the ultimate decision — for the uncertainty to become an issue on the Golden State roster. Players talk about possibly becoming part of a sign-and-trade. Others know it will influence their own contract situations, regardless of what K.D. does in a month.
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Harrison Barnes, for example. He will be a restricted free agent on July 1 and plays the same position as Durant, small forward. Barnes would love to stay. But asked if he thinks he is staying, he told NBA.com: “Assuming no one else chooses to sign here?”
He smiled.
“It’s out of my control,” Barnes said. “People say, ‘Do you want to be here in Golden State?’ A lot of it is, look, I love Golden State. I’d love to be here. But there’s also some other factors that factor into that, you know what I’m saying?”
Andrew Bogut feels the same way:
Bogut has likewise made it clear he wants to stay, to the point of hoping to sign an extension in October rather than waiting another year to become a free agent and being eligible for millions of dollars more. But when he spoke about the possibility in March, he said, “We all hear the rumors of other guys coming through here, so if that kind of stuff happens they’ll be some shedding of some contracts, so who knows what can happen?”
