On Dec. 3, 2012, the Golden State Warriors lost to the Orlando Magic. Arron Afflalo and Glen Davis led Orlando in scoring, Draymond Green was still backing up David Lee, Steph Curry and Klay Thompson took 12 of Golden State’s 17 3-point attempts, and Mark Jackson patrolled the Oracle Arena sidelines. 

It was the last time the Warriors played at home in front of anything less than a sellout crowd. 

The Warriors had no idea what was possible before Curry’s superstar ascension. As he prepares for Year 18 with the franchise, no one knows what the organization will look like when his career ends, either.

Curry, 38, may have a few great seasons left, but life without the two-time MVP is something Golden State employees talk about more frequently these days. 

The Warriors are no longer just a basketball team. Under owners Joe Lacob and Peter Guber, they’ve built an $11 billion (opens in new tab) sports and entertainment behemoth that was unimaginable before Curry made them the hottest ticket in sports. Now, with the dynasty fading, the organization will soon face a test: Can ownership keep the machine humming without the man who supercharged it?

Perhaps when he’s gone, whenever that may be, the Warriors’ sellout streak — which dates to Dec. 18, 2012 — could be in jeopardy. Nothing lasts forever. 

But Warriors president and COO Brandon Schneider rejects that premise.

“You said it won’t go on forever — why not?” he asked inside his office overlooking McCovey Cove and the Bay Bridge. 

Schneider’s confidence isn’t brash; it’s rooted in a belief in the dedication of Warriors fans like himself. He joined the franchise in 2002 as a season-ticket account executive and saw fans pack Oracle Arena during a period in which the team missed the postseason in 17 of 18 years.

Schneider can see Giants home games from his corner office. The Warriors’ neighbors have had intermittent attendance issues in recent years as the franchise has missed the playoffs in eight of nine seasons. The Giants have mostly floundered since winning three World Series in five years, making days at the waterfront ballpark feel like an exercise in nostalgia. 

Something similar could be coming for the Warriors. But there’s internal confidence in the infrastructure — in Golden State Group’s track record — to thrive despite whatever uncertainty lies ahead.    

“Because we have such loyal fans, they’re going to show up whether we’re the favorite to win the championship or we have a year or two when we’re rebuilding and we have young, exciting players that people are excited about,” Schneider said. 

It’s been seven years since Lacob spelled out his vision for the franchise. 

“I want this to become more than a basketball team,” the owner told The Athletic. “I want it to become a sports entertainment, media, and technology company. It’s not just a team.” 

That’s how Lacob described Phase 3 of the process of turning the Warriors into a championship-winning, ultra-profitable franchise. 

From Lacob’s mind to reality. 

Since Lacob and Guber bought the Warriors 15 years ago, the ownership group has ridden an astonishing winning streak of masterstrokes. Back then, it owned one team. Now the Golden State Group owns three — the Warriors, Valkyries, and G League Sea Dubs — plus a conglomerate of tangential business ventures. 

The WNBA’s Valkyries are the world’s the first billion-dollar (opens in new tab) women’s sports franchise. The Warriors are the most valuable NBA team (opens in new tab). Both play at the privately funded Chase Center, a model for investment in the age of owners grubbing for taxpayer dollars. Schneider says the venue hosts about 1,000 events annually, including basketball games, concerts, comedy shows, private functions, and special competitions like the Laver Cup. 

As the already affluent region blossomed into one of the wealthiest in the world, Golden State’s portfolio has boomed. 

Lacob and Guber bought the Warriors for $450 million in 2010. The franchise is now worth about 2,000% more. They paid a $50 million expansion fee three years ago for the Valkyries, who opened their second season Friday and improved to 2-0 in front of a sold-out crowd at Sunday’s first home game.

“We knew it was going to be fun and a great thing, or else we wouldn’t have bought the expansion team,” Schneider told The Standard. “But it’s been better than I think any of us could have imagined.” 

That sentiment could apply to practically anything Lacob and the Golden State Group has touched. Schneider sees no end in sight. 

“I think our fans take pride in the loyalty and how they’re part of us winning,” Schneider said.

“Look, we couldn’t have had the success we’ve had over all these years without the fans. Without the loyalty of the fans coming to the games, supporting us, watching games, doing all those things that allow us to make the investment that we make to win. So it’s that flywheel that all goes together. And I don’t think that’s ever going to stop.”

It’s tough to have a focused conversation with Schneider these days. The Golden State portfolio is too diversified. There’s the Valkyries and Warriors, the Thrive City real estate project (an 11-acre, privately funded mixed-use district surrounding Chase Center) that’s nearly full with tenants, and the Golden State Community Foundation — known to be one of the biggest nonprofit arms in team sports. 

It’s an empire, with streams of revenue that soften the blow of the Warriors missing the playoffs this year, thereby losing out on lucrative postseason home dates.  

When Schneider joined the Warriors, the organization had about 75 employees. The staff has since increased to roughly 700, outgrowing the office space next to Chase Center and into a new space in Mission Rock. 

It’s there where he explains his “flywheel” theory of sports management. 

The way the operation works, Schneider says, is ownership invests in the basketball teams, which in turn leads to fans spending their most scarce resource — time — as well as their hard-earned money. The organization takes the revenue and redistributes it back into the teams and the fan experience. 

It’s a feedback loop of success. The Warriors have won four titles and reached two more NBA Finals since 2015. Their sellout streak is the second-longest in the NBA. They’re still the biggest slice of the Golden State revenue pie.

In fact, Sportico estimates that every Warriors home game generates roughly $5 million in ticket revenue. Sportico valuations reporter Kurt Badenhausen said Warriors revenue is roughly 35% higher than that of the Knicks and Lakers, the second- and third-most valuable NBA franchises. 

“The Chase Center is like one giant ATM for ownership,” Badenhausen said.

The flywheel will need to keep spinning whenever Curry’s done too. From a purely financial perspective, revenue shouldn’t be an immediate concern. The franchise has banked corporate sponsorships (like jersey patch sponsor Rakuten) and luxury suites that are often long-term deals. 

They also have precedent on their side.

The Chicago Bulls are still a global brand, even though they’ve made one conference finals trip since Michael Jordan. That’s almost three decades of goodwill earned by Jordan’s dynasty. The Dallas Cowboys, likewise, haven’t reached a Super Bowl in the 21st century but remain the most valuable NFL franchise. 

“It’ll be an interesting next few years,” Badenhausen said. “But from a revenue-stream standpoint, outside of maybe not having the playoff revenues that they had during the golden years of the franchise, they are head and shoulders — they’re so far ahead of everybody else in the league in terms of revenue. I don’t see a big drop-off coming with the Warriors.” 

No expansion team had won double-digit games in an inaugural season, but the Valkyries blew past expectations last year and reached the playoffs. The team set the all-time league attendance record in Year 1.

“People assume that the Valkyries in certain ways draft off the Warriors,” Schneider said. “I wouldn’t say it that way, but I think there’s things that the Warriors have done to help the Valkyries get going. But over time, I believe that the Warriors will benefit more from the association with the Valkyries than the Valkyries will benefit from their association with the Warriors. And I mean that. I just think that, over time, as we think about how fans feel about our organization and want to be a part of that, I think that will be the case.” 

Practically everything with the Valkyries, from the launch and branding to the immediate on-court success under Ohemaa Nyanin and Natalie Nakase, has gone according to plan. The franchise’s arrival came after the Athletics and Raiders left the Bay Area, as Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese entered the league, and satiated a decades-long hunger in the region for a WNBA team. 

“They set a new bar for what an expansion franchise can do,” Badenhausen said. “It was just like a perfect storm to hit the ground running.” 

Sportico values the Valkyries at $850 million. (opens in new tab) The trade also estimates that the franchise generated nearly $80 million in its first year. 

One of the reasons the organization rebranded to the Golden State Group was to combat the perception that the Valkyries would be subservient to the Warriors. They didn’t want the Valkyries to be the Warriors’ WNBA team but rather their own entity, treated on the same plane.

The data point that expresses the teams’ distinctions is the fact that only 8% of the Valkyries’ 12,000 season ticket holders overlap (opens in new tab) with those of the Warriors. 

Valkyries president Jess Smith was employee No. 1. Now she has a team of 70. 

While the Valkyries’ clear upward trajectory is distinct from that of the Warriors, Smith mirrors Schneider’s optimism. 

“The phrase that I’ve really started to lean on about describing our culture is ‘joyfully relentless,’” Smith said. “We’re just so happy to be here, but like, unsatisfied. Like, there’s no end in sight, right?” 

The Valkyries started from scratch and became the biggest women’s franchise in the world overnight. 

The Warriors have decades of history, a competitive ownership group, and institutional knowledge in the front office. Even in a post-Curry world, they won’t have to start from scratch.

Eventually, the Golden State Group will find out how strong loyalty really is. Maybe that’s Phase 4. 

“It’s our job to make sure people are interested and excited about the Warriors year after year,” Schneider said. “Our fans deserve that. So that’s what we intend to continue to do.” 

The Standard’s Jane Kenny contributed reporting