Warriors Announce New Starting Lineup vs. Jazz

With Draymond Green out with a foot injury, the Warriors had to change their starting lineup against the Jazz. But instead of simply replacing Green with Quinten Post and keeping everything else the same, they made two changes.

The new starting lineup features Post for Green and Gary Payton II for Will Richard.

Warriors starters tonight vs Jazz

Steph Curry
Moses Moody
Jimmy Butler
Gary Payton II
Quinten Post
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) November 25, 2025

With Payton in the lineup, Jimmy Butler (6'6") essentially moves to the 4 and Moses Moody (6'5") to the 3, which is notable because the Jazz start two 7-footers in Lauri Markkanen and Jusuf Nurkic.

Why Payton Is In for Richard

This isn't a move to get more size on the court, as Payton (6'2") is actually an inch shorter than Richard (6'3").

But Payton is a better on-ball defender, which the Warriors need after getting dominated by Deni Avdija on Friday. He's also used to doing big-man duties like rolling to the basket and finishing at the rim, which could be valuable for an offense that's lacking players comfortable doing that.

With that said, Richard is a much better shooter than Payton, so there's no guarantee Payton enhances this lineup.

Overall, Monday's starting lineup has played just five possessions this season with an outrageous plus-90 net rating, per Cleaning the Glass. But that's the ultimate small sample size.

Warriors' Frontcourt Plan

It's just about guaranteed that Quinten Post will play big minutes at center, and Trayce Jackson-Davis will get some extended run as well.

But that's just the center equation.

Without Green, Al Horford and Jonathan Kuminga, the Warriors also need to fill 48 minutes at power forward.

Butler and Moody will have to scale up for some of those minutes, but that can come at a cost of tiring them out while they battle for rebounds out of position all night.

So expect Gui Santos (6'7") to play a lot of minutes at power forward. Santos' season high in minutes this season is 18:26, but he topped that 20 times last year. He's more than capable of playing 25-plus minutes.

No matter what the Warriors do, they'll be undersized Monday, but at least Santos gives them an option to up the physicality.