Blake Griffin didn't negotiate a no-trade clause in his new contract with the Clippers and was traded in the first year of the deal. Stephen Curry similarly signed a new contract with the Warriors in the offseason and he also doesn't own a no-trade clause.

Curry was asked about not having the no-trade on Tuesday.

“Just a negotiation situation,” Curry said. “Obviously, it'd be nice to have one, but it wasn't in the cards. For me, I don't say I regret not getting one.”

Curry said the two sides “talked about it a little bit,” but ultimately agreed against adding a no-trade clause.

“They try to set a precedent that nobody gets one around here,” Curry told The Athletic. “But you would hope situations that happened with Blake don't happen with this team.”

LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony and Dirk Nowitzki are the only players in the NBA with a no-trade clause.

Curry won't have the same leverage as those three players.

“But it's part of the NBA, man,” Curry said. “It's been that way forever. I'd hope that down the line in my career I play well enough to have winning ways and we continue to do what we've been doing and things will happen according to our successes as I go through the rest of the five years in my contract.”

The Golden State Warriors have expressed interest in trading for Kyle O'Quinn.

The New York Knicks have an excess of centers in Enes Kanter, Willy Hernangomez, Joakim Noah and O'Quinn.

The Warriors have their own issues with too many centers in Zaza Pachulia, David West, JaVale McGee and Jordan Bell.

"O'Quinn has certainly outperformed his contract," said David Jacober, a strategic planning consultant for NBA teams. "His diversity on offense makes him attractive to a number of teams, such as Houston and Golden State."

O'Quinn has a $4.2 million player option for next season that he's expected to decline.

Despite dropping the season series to the Rockets 2-1, the Warriors are not overly concerned by their Western Conference rival.

"No," Kevin Durant responded when asked if it mattered. "The season starts over when you're in the playoffs anyway, so it doesn't matter. You're going to have to get through these teams to get to where you want to go. You have to play at home and on the road, so it really doesn't matter. We just want to be playing good basketball when it comes down to that point."

"It's game 40-what? Seven, eight?" Draymond Green asked during the media scrum. "Who we play on Tuesday? We just got to get ready for [New York]. Home court will take care of itself down the road."

Durant did say he is impressed with the new Houston squad.

"They're very tough," Durant said. "I really like this team, I really like their coach, they got a good home crowd. I think the difference between them last year and this year -- obviously, everybody I know, everyone is going to say CP, but they're just playing harder. I feel like they're playing harder on the defensive side of the ball, I feel like they've got versatile defenders. [Clint] Capela has gotten better. It's just more than CP. They're doing a good job of meshing together."

Following Houston's 116-108 win over the Warriors on Saturday, Clint Capela spoke about the confidence he has in his team.

"We're confident because we know if we're doing what we're supposed to do, we're going to beat them," Capela told ESPN. "We've got to keep playing. We know that they're going to come back if we have the lead, and we've just got to keep that mindset. Sometimes I feel like, in the past, we were all dragging down after mistakes. But today, we were ready. I think that if we're doing what we're supposed to do on defense -- all the switches, the weak side -- and keep playing our offense by keeping that mentality all game long, we have the weapons to beat them.

"We are better than them."

James Harden also said Houston's Saturday night win was important "for our swag."

In an analytical piece about how the Golden State Warriors are using Jordan Bell as a small ball center, Jonathan Tjarks relays an anecdote about how the number of traditional bigs in the NBA will continue to decline.

"There’s a positive feedback loop happening with small ball: The more teams play it, the less valuable every traditional 5 in the league becomes," writes Tjarks. "I talked to one executive who thinks the number of big men in the NBA will be cut in half by 2020. Every team will soon be looking for its own version of Jordan Bell, if they aren’t already."

The Warriors acquired the draft rights to Bell from the Bulls, who fell to the second round. 

"The irony is that Bell is exactly the type of big man those teams need against Golden State," writes Tjarks. "He wouldn’t be as successful with less offensive talent around him, but a player with his skill set is inherently valuable."

The Warriors have a net rating of +14.9 when Bell has played this season, which is the fourth best mark on the team.

Kevin Durant's desire to eventually own an NBA team has increased since joining the Golden State Warriors.

Durant and his business partner Rich Kleiman have taken numerous meetings with existing owners and tech CEOs to gather information about the endeavor.

One source says "this is a genuine goal of his after he retires, to add another African-American in the position of majority ownership."

LeBron James also has interest in owning an NBA franchise while Michael Jordan is the only current African-American majority owner of an NBA team.

"MJ was the first big Nike athlete, the biggest star of his time, but if you don't have the trajectory, that path, that journey, it's going to be hard to do what he did," Durant said. "But you can still affect the NBA and the game of basketball in a different way. You don't have to be an owner. I think it should be more guys in the positions of power like general managers and scouts and coaches. Anything that involves the day-to-day operations of these franchises. I think more players and more experienced players should be in those positions."

Durant has investments in Rubrik (a cloud computing startup), Overtime (a sports technology media startup), the pizza chain Pieology, the app Acorns, Postmates (an on-demand delivery service), and Skydio (an autonomous drone startup).

"We're paid for what we can do on the basketball court and most players know these paychecks are not going to come on the first and 15th for the rest of our lives," he said. "If we get a big sum of money, why not try to help it grow? That's what entrepreneurs and Fortune-500 CEOs do. They get a crop of money and they try to grow it. They get a product and they try to grow it. We're our own business. Why not try to control that and why not try to leverage that to provide a better life after you're done playing? That's what it's about."

Kevin Durant is not interested in being one of the captains of the All-Star Game in which he would pick teams with the leading vote getter of the Eastern Conference.

“I don't want to do it,” Durant told The Athletic. “I'd rather somebody else do it. It's cool to be an All-Star, but all the extra stuff … I just want to go play in the game. (The new format)'s cool, a different way, a creative way that's good for the fans. But me, I'll let somebody else pick the teams.”

Stephen Curry is likely to finish with the most votes and actually be the captain of the Western Conference.

“Why not?” Curry told The Athletic. “I'll be the first to usher in the new system. I used to go to the playground all the time and you wanted to be the guy picking teams. That meant you were something on the court back in the day. It'll be a cool vibe to see how it all shakes out and how unique you can make the lineups.”

“Yeah, yeah, I'm definitely going to Twitter tonight to get those Steph Curry #NBAVotes in,” Durant laughed. “Because he'd be a perfect guy to pick teams. Me on the other hand, don't think I'll do so well.”

Kevin Durant believes he can continue his playing career until he's 40 years old.

"Yeah, I feel like I can. I feel like I can. It’s just a matter of me – is my mind ready to play for that long? Because that’s 80 percent of the battle, in my opinion," said Durant.

Durant was extremely healthy during his first seven seasons and hasn't had a recurrence of his foot issues from the 14-15 season.

Durant was asked if playing is currently a grind.

"Is it a grind? No, I mean I’m having fun. I’m enjoying it. I’m still in my 20s, and I’m about to hit the golden year – 30 (laughs). I can’t wait for that. So I’m just excited where I am right now. But I know how exhausting it is mentally to be up every single day for a game, especially when you’re trying to be great at every part of the game. That’s mentally taxing. I’ve got nothing but love and respect dudes who play that long, so we’ll see. I feel like I’m doing something good in the world when I play basketball, so if I keep feeling that way then hopefully I (keep playing)."

Durant became the second youngest player in NBA history to score 20,000 points and was asked if he might be able to break Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's scoring record.

"I mean it would be cool to do that, but I’m not concerned about that, man. If I start focusing on that, it’s going to take my focus on what I really want to do. But for me as a player, though, like even if (that sort of mark) is in the back of my mind I know how easy it is to get off what I want to do. I know myself. That’s what I’m saying."

Stephen Curry sustained a sprained right ankle during shootaround and will miss Wednesday's game against the Clippers.

The Warriors will also be without Klay Thompson due to rest.

Curry was out for several weeks after spraining his ankle on Dec. 4th.

Tim Kawakami suggests the Golden State Warriors have likely begun to target Anthony Davis in their long-term decision-making.

The Warriors targeted Kevin Durant in the 2016 offseason for at least two years and when it looked like an absolute longshot.

Davis can become a free agent in 2020 and the New Orleans Pelicans could consider trading him before that offseason though they have yet to given any indication he will be available in the near or distant future.

The Warriors would almost certainly need to include either Klay Thompson or Draymond Green or potentially both to trade for Davis. Thompson will become a free agent in 2019 while Green will be a free agent in 2020.

When Kawakami interviewed Joe Lacob for his podcast a few weeks ago, the word he used was “differentiate” when he talked about moves the Warriors might make in the future.