The flurry of unexpected trades continued Thursday with another pre-Draft move featuring the Washington Wizards. The Golden State Warriors have reportedly agreed to trade Jordan Poole to the Washington Wizards for Chris Paul, according to ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski, and have included future picks in the deal.
Wojnarowski noted that the deal between the Phoenix Suns and Washington Wizards for Bradley Beal hadn't been finalized until today, but these two deals are independent of each other.
How this Impacts Warriors NBA Title Odds
The Warriors were listed at +1300 to win the NBA title at FanDuel and their odds moved very slightly to +1200 after the news broke. They still sit behind the Boston Celtics (+460), Denver Nuggets (+470), Milwaukee Bucks (+500) and Phoenix Suns (+650).
Action Network Senior Writer Matt Moore was already high on the Warriors after the NBA Finals and thinks the move is a step in the right direction for Golden State to win a fifth championship in the Steve Kerr era.
Moore's Betting Analysis
The Warriors are fully primed to compete now and maximize however many years of prime Stephen Curry they have left. Adding Paul doesn't radically reshape them.
They remain undersized and Paul is less of an explosive scorer than Poole, and will "eat fewer innings" as far as being a backup who can play when Curry or Klay Thompson are resting/injured in the regular season.
Paul is still an elite floor general, will improve the non-Curry minutes — which have been slowly getting worse as Draymond Green and Thompson age — and can have a bounceback with the Warriors' elite training and health staff.
The Warriors need to make more moves to add better veterans or more talent down the roster, which is why they continue to pursue trades both in and out of Thursday's NBA Draft. But this move definitively signals a desire to go for it now, while shedding Poole's long-term salary.
I would expect the Warriors' title odds, which already shortened after the Paul trade, to shorten further by mid-July once the league finishes its annual reshuffling of the deck.
