25-under-25: D’Angelo Russell, the NBA’s unplanned nomad

D’Angelo Russell probably didn’t see his career playing out like this. It isn’t a good or bad thing that he’s bounced around the league. It just is.

At age 23, D’Angelo Russell is coming off his best NBA season, where ramped everything up after Caris LeVert went down with an injury. He was an All-Star last season and helped the Brooklyn Nets make the playoffs. And now, for next season, he’s now playing for the Golden State Warriors — his third team — because the Nets went and signed Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant.

Brooklyn upgraded, surely, but it’s still an odd reality for Russell. And lest we forget, Russell’s path to Brooklyn was abnormal too. Remember the whole Nick Young/Snapchat saga that led to the Los Angeles Lakers basically giving up for former No. 2 overall pick for nothing?

Russell is the NBA’s unplanned nomad. It’s hard to know exactly how rare something like this is, but his path — top-two pick to toxic asset to cornerstone to being pushed out — is odd. And the path he chose this summer — to sign with the Warriors — makes this even odder.

Yes, Russell got paid. He has $117 million reasons to be happy with his decision and, if he plays up to that contract, he’ll be in line for another big deal before his 30th birthday. There is nothing really wrong with Russell’s path. His goal this summer (and rightly so) was to get paid first and foremost. He did that, and it also happens to be with the league’s current leading franchise.

What’s odd about it is that it sets him up to continue to be a nomad, in theory. From the moment Golden State acquired him, there was some reporting and speculation that it was a signing to help a roster that will be missing Durant and Klay Thompson next year, but also a signing to give general manager Bob Myers an asset to work with.

It’s impossible to really know how valuable Russell is on that contract, but you can see Myers’ thinking: Get a good young player teams will want, boost his value playing in the Warriors’ system and then flip him for the best stuff possible to help the Thompson/Stephen Curry/Draymond Green core contend for the next several years. Russell is good and should help Curry and Green carry for the load for as long as Thompson is out with his ACL year. Long-term, though, it’s just hard to see him being a core part of what the Warriors do.

Russell will benefit from this set-up too. Playing alongside Curry is going to make his game develop in different ways. For one, he can get more work off ball and likely benefit from the gravity of Curry’s presence. Secondly, he can work on his creative touch and feed Curry, one of the league’s most devastating off-ball players. And much like he benefited from playing in Brooklyn’s culture, he’s going to benefit from his time with the Warriors, however long it is.

If the Lakers were his undergrad education, and the Nets were grad school, the Warriors are his Ph.D. program. How Steve Kerr and the rest of Warriors’ coaching staff pushes Russell’s game vs. letting him play the way he has the last few years — 3s, mid-range, some shots at the rim, but mostly scoring oriented — will be one of the more interesting subplots to follow early in the season.

But how long will it last? From Dec. 15 on, once he’s eligible to be traded, Russell’s future will be something to watch. By this time next year, he could very well be playing point guard in Minnesota or Indiana or Phoenix or some other NBA city, based on who offers Golden State the best package.

That’s life as the NBA’s unplanned nomad. Where he plays is no longer really up to him. It is what it is.

The insider’s perspective

by Anthony Pesta

The Golden State Warriors are going to rely heavily on D’Angelo Russell to help run the offense this season. The young All-Star averaged career highs in points and assists last year and will look to take the next step in his development with a championship-contending team.

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