Jonathan Kuminga and his future with the Golden State Warriors is clouded, and his agent Aaron Turner isn’t hiding the uncertainty.
Turner confirmed that his client is considering taking the qualifying offer and walking into unrestricted free agency next summer.
“He wants to pick where he wants to go. So the QO is real for sure,” Turner said appearing on ESPN’s The Hoop Collective podcast.
Golden State has already presented multiple contract offers to Kuminga. One deal was a three-year, $75.2 million contract with a team option in the final season.
Another was two years, $45 million, but structured with a team option in year two and without a no-trade clause. The third was a three-year, $54 million offer that Turner felt undervalued his client.
The issue, Turner emphasized, is control.
“If JK wants to take [the qualifying offer], it does have upside, right? We’ve talked about that. You’re not getting traded. You’re going to have unrestricted free agency,” Turner explained. “People are going to say, ‘Well, Aaron, there’s not going to be 10 or 12 teams [with cap space].’ Fine, there’ll be six teams with cap space for the clear-cut under-35 top wing on the market. So there’s a lot of upside.”
The Warriors, still focused on chasing wins with Jimmy Butler and Draymond Green in the frontcourt, have struggled to define Kuminga’s role.
Head coach Steve Kerr has never fully leaned on him and has made it very clear Kumimga doesn’t fit in, in terms of the style he wants to implement as a coach.
Trade talks with Sacramento and Phoenix earlier this summer reportedly stalled.
With an October 1 deadline looming, either Golden State and Kuminga reach a compromise deal, or the forward accepts the qualifying offer and positions himself for a fresh start elsewhere.
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