The Golden State Warriors hope to re-sign Kevin Durant in free agency, but they are approaching the situation in an amenable way in an attempt to not simply lose him for nothing.
"I think there's a couple of things in play here," said Brian Windhorst on Get Up. "I'm going to just be honest with you: my sense is that the Warriors are in a scramble mode to do anything that they can to either keep Kevin or not lose him for nothing.
"The last thing that the Warriors want is for him to just go sign with the Nets, or sign with the Knicks. So in addition to offering him the five-year contract and hoping he will either stay with them, or be willing to rehab with them and then be traded. The Warriors are wide open to considering sign-and-trade scenarios.
"Let's say Kevin wants to go to the Nets. They would love to do a sign-and-trade with the Nets. You might say what would they get back? They could get back a trade exception where you would get a $35 million, basically gift certificate that they could then use to go get other players, which they're going to need. They have no functional way to improve their team because they won't have salary cap space if he leaves. The Warriors really want to work alongside Kevin Durant.
"Now the Nets wouldn't really be incentivized, or the Knicks or the Clippers, so that might not end up happening."