I separated 10 Desert Kings and potted them. Each is about 5' tall. At this point, the book says to cut them way back (3'), but if I do I'll lose the entire fig crop come August since ALL the figs grow on the tips of OLD growth. I am aware of root systems to weak to support 5' plants. Have any of you had this conflict?  Did you take a chance and NOT follow best practices when extracting and replanting? What's your take on this?

FIG PROBLEMS LOL,  my thoughts are if there isn't many roots they shouldn't produce much fruit anyway. you can either work on permanent structure or fruit production. I would split them and try both to see what works best over the long term plus you'll still get some figs. if the figs aren't sizing up well you can always take them off to save energy. I did find a good video on youtube about setting up permanent structure for dk brebas. you can always take some air layers or cuttings too. I hope that helps.

Don't believe everything you read.  I'd probably get them into bigger pots (7-10 gal) but I wouldn't touch the wood until after fruiting.

Hi TahomaGuy2,
First question: Why did you plant them in pots instead of in ground ? In which usda Zone are you ? ( question2: Where did you get that many trees in one go ?!? Did you make a ninja raid ? )
And last question : will you keep them (you want fruit)? sell them (you might want bigger leaves and growth so less fruit) ?
Now to be more serious, if keeping them for myself, I would attempt to get the figs. Those stems are woody and have lots of energy to get those figs to grow.
In ground, here, I wouldn't have a problem with that especially if they already have roots now.
Just don't forget, come Spring, to water them properly (a bit more, because of less roots) and to fertilize them ( for them to grow roots quickly ).
Next year, until July, keep them half shaded as full sun will challenge them too badly.

You will see that some will perform better than others, no matter the cares you give to them. But I still think that most of them will produce fruits.
So just chance it !

Hi Charles with 10 of them you should experiment , do some for fruit ,some for structure and some in between

dido what Mario just wrote. But generally speaking, they should be cut back quite severely or they will languish for the first season.