HOUSTON – Beneath the surface of a night that had a generational superstar wincing his way off the floor and a narrowly-dodged right jab, Gui Santos – a player who could have been able to step up and help provide solutions to a team that needed them – instead looked lost.
The Warriors’ 24-year-old Energizer Bunny had it all right there by training camp. A late-season breakout in 2025-26 led to a three-year, $15 million extension in February. Santos married longtime partner Julia Lawrenz dos Santos a few months later, and his years-long journey from Brazil had finally reached a certain stability. In September, Steve Kerr called Santos “one of our most important players.”
Advertisement
Then Santos aggravated a tendon in his knee Oct. 24 in Phoenix, and fell out of sync.
“It’s just like, weird,” Santos told the Chronicle, after the Warriors’ loss to Houston Wednesday night. “I was feeling weird out there.”
The problem is no longer the knee, after Santos sat a couple games in early November and has been ramping up on a minutes restriction. The knee is back to where it was to start the year. The problem is his rhythm. He is averaging 2.5 points in 13.5 minutes per game in four November games, shooting 25% from the floor. On Wednesday, Santos simply looked uncomfortable in his own movements, committing four turnovers in 12 minutes.
“You start a game, you turn the ball over twice, and you think, like, ‘S-,'” Santos recalled. “‘C’mon. Who is that? That’s not me. That’s not what I do.’
Advertisement
“And just, the next-play mentality,” he continued. “I’m trying to do that. I’m doing that. But some days, things don’t go right. And you go through a – slump… Just got to figure out how to get out of there quick. That’s what I’m trying to do right now.”
That sense of urgency is now heightened, Santos acknowledged. Stephen Curry is down and out, likely until or beyond early December. His absence will pull the curtain back on an intricate Rube Goldberg machine in Golden State, chugging out an eight-game win streak but imperfect and clunky and already missing several key parts beyond Curry, the main energy source.
The Warriors’ injury situation is worse than you might even think. With Curry and backup sparkplug Brandon Williams sidelined, the Warriors – factoring in Jimmy Butler, Kristaps Porzingis and Moses Moody – are now missing over $154 million in salary from their rotation. That’s roughly 94% of the baseline NBA salary cap, and a near-impossible formula to win games. At the moment, the Warriors have just 10 players on standard contracts plus three more two-way players who aren’t facing some kind of indefinite absence.
The problems don’t stop there. Veteran Gary Payton II, 33, has now missed two straight games with knee inflammation. Forty-year-old big Al Horford has offered stretches of impactful minutes but can’t be counted upon for back-to-backs. Santos, who would be a key starter in small-ball lineups with Draymond Green at center, has yet to find the form that earned him last year’s extension.
Advertisement
“I was playing the right basketball, you know,” Santos told the Chronicle. “Right now, I’m just feeling that. I’m kinda like, not playing that basketball no more.”
Golden State Warriors forward Gui Santos looks on during introductions before a game against the New Orleans Pelicans on Monday, Nov. 9, 2026, in San Francisco. (Heather Diehl/Associated Press)
The hits keep coming. Second-year wing Will Richard made spot starts at small forward this season in place of Santos, but fully tore the ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) in his left thumb Saturday. He was presented an option to try to play through it or just have surgery, and chose to try to play through it. Here’s the kicker: he’ll need to have surgery anyway, he told the Chronicle.
This is a matter of how much pain Richard can handle. There isn’t pain, right now. That is subject to change.
Advertisement
“I’m testing it out,” Richard said. “Hopefully I can just go through the whole year and then just wear the splint, and get it at the end of the season. But, test it out in the games. Hopefully it doesn’t get hit too much, where I have to get surgery sooner than I want to, but yeah, I’m gonna try to test it out.”
Curry’s injury introduces a new problem into the Warriors’ ecosystem: the Non-Yaxel Minutes. The Warriors have found some salvation in burgeoning Rookie of the Year favorite Yaxel Lendeborg, who looked largely up to the task of leading Golden State’s non-Curry offense against Houston: 25 points, 9-of-19 shooting, 10 rebounds. But when Lendeborg is off the floor, the Warriors’ options to help shoulder the offensive burden at his position are limited. Even in Williams’ absence, Golden State’s most daunting roster-makeup issue isn’t guard depth behind Curry; it’s wing depth behind and around Lendeborg.
Santos and veteran Georges Niang combined to shoot just 1-for-10 against Houston. Richard hit a couple massive corner threes and is coming along as a catch-and-shoot threat, but he also committed two key fourth-quarter turnovers.
There are several silver linings, now, that lend real credibility to the idea that Golden State can stay afloat during Curry’s absence. Brandin Podziemski took to flipping and studying Curry’s movements as a lefty this offseason, and could carve out a real foothold in the Most Improved Player race on increased offensive volume. Across his last 32 games, dating back to the last two months of 2025-26, Podziemski averaged 17.9 points and 3.8 assists a game. That’s enough of a 1-2 punch, with Lendeborg, to legitimately carry Golden State’s offense in heavy-minute lineups.
Advertisement
New assistant head coach Frank Vogel has brought life to the Warriors’ defense, with Golden State currently sitting at 11th in the NBA in defensive rating. Between Green, Podziemski, De’Anthony Melton and a center rotation with Charles Bassey and Horford, Golden State has the defenders to maintain tenacity on that end. This isn’t the same group that collapsed last season when Curry went down for two months with knee issues.
“I think the spirit of this team is better,” Green said. “We’re more certain on who we are, what make us a good team, and I think that puts us in a better position to be successful without him as opposed to where we were last year. And then obviously Yax, having a guy who you can still get the ball to who can create an advantage, BP’s playing a lot better. So with the growth of BP, the growth of our young guys, incorporating Yax … I think it definitely puts us in a better position.”
At 8-4, Golden State has given itself the early-season cushion to scuffle without Curry for a stretch and still stay afloat, in theoretical time for Butler and Moody to return. But it’s not ideal just 12 games into the season.
Getting Santos right, for one, can pay dividends.
Advertisement
“I feel like I need to get back to my best version to help the team,” Santos said. “Because me being the best version (is) going to help the team. I’m not talking about scoring. I’m talking about… making the right decisions. And every time I do it, it helps the team. And when I stop doing it, it’s just a bad look for me.”
Subscribe
There’s more to San Francisco with the Chronicle. Subscribe today for just 25¢.
This article originally published at Warriors without Steph Curry might be worse than you realize. How can they stay afloat?.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
