Getty Draymond Green reacts during Game 6 of the 2022 NBA Finals between the Golden State Warriors and the Boston Celtics.
The Golden State Warriors have been the bane of existence to the Los Angeles Lakers and the Los Angeles Clippers for the last decade, and that isn’t likely to change anytime soon.
Dubs’ forward and four-time NBA champion Draymond Green entered the league in 2012, during the midst of the final years of the Kobe Bryant era in L.A. The Lakers had won back-to-back titles just two years before while Green was playing his junior and senior seasons at Michigan State University.
Green appeared on the Thursday, September 15 edition of the Checc’n In Podcast With Big U produced by Caffeine and spoke about what it was like to come up in the Western Conference at that time, when the Warriors were dealing with the end of a Lakers’ dynasty and a Clippers squad on the rise.
For us, when we really started to come to play in the West, was once we started having battles with the Clippers. The Lakers for us was like, “That’s cool, that’s them. We can’t compete with that.” They OG’s, like, if we’re going to match up with them in the playoffs and they beat us, they supposed to, that’s cool.
So we weren’t really looking at the Lakers like, “We gotta get to them.” Who we were looking at was — everyone at that time was talking about how the Clippers were the next young team up, but we didn’t believe that.
Clippers Never Truly on Warriors’ Level Over Last Decade
GettyDeAndre Jordan (left) of the Los Angeles Clippers is intercepted by Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and Doc Rivers after an altercation with Andrew Bogut of the Golden State Warriors at Staples Center on October 31, 2013 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Stephen Dunn/Getty Images)
Green and the Dubs had several heated regular season exchanges with the Chris Paul and Blake Griffin-led Clippers over the years, though they only ever matched up in the postseason on two occasions.
Golden State fell 4-3 to L.A. in the opening round of the 2013-14 playoffs, then avenged that series defeat by winning 4-2 in the first round of the 2018-19 playoffs. Even still, the Dubs got the better of their intrastate foes by conquering the league over the last eight years, earning six trips to the NBA Finals and capturing four rings behind the Big 3 of Green, Steph Curry and Klay Thompson.
The Clippers, on the other hand, were the subjects of all-time postseason meltdowns, blowing 2-0 leads twice in the first round to the Memphis Grizzlies in 2012-13 and the Portland Trail Blazers in 2015-16. They also famously tanked a 3-1 series lead against the Houston Rockets in 2014-15, a blown lead that continues to define a postseason legacy for Paul that is full of catastrophic stumbles.
That Clippers’ core group broke up in 2017 having never earned a berth in a Western Conference Finals, while the Warriors remain a collective as they enter the 2022-23 campaign among the title favorites yet again.
The rivalry could be renewed this year, however, as the Clippers will also be among the favorites to win the West and hoist a championship trophy should Kawhi Leonard and Paul George remain healthy for the balance of the season.
Green Continues Lakers Rivalry Via Long History With LeBron James
GettyLeBron James (right) of the Los Angeles Lakers is guarded by Draymond Green (left) of the Golden State Warriors at Chase Center on October 5, 2019 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
As for the Lakers, they have never really been a dominant force at the same time as the Warriors. The Bryant era wound down at the same time the Dubs’ Big 3 era was winding up, so while there was some overlap, it was never ultra-competitive.
The Lakers then sunk into a several-year bout with incompetence and irrelevance while the Warriors’ reigned as kings of the NBA. That changed a little when L.A. secured the services of long-time Golden State competitor LeBron James, who met the Dubs in the Finals on four consecutive occasions as the leader of the Cleveland Cavaliers.
But even then, periods of excellence between the franchises did not truly coincide. The Lakers won their sole title with James the year Kevin Durant left the Bay Area, and Thompson and Curry were sidelined by season-ending injuries. Then last year, as the Dubs resurrected a dynasty, James and his Lakers counterpart Anthony Davis were unable to drag the Los Angeles into the playoffs.
Still, there is some hope for a renewal of a rivalry between the Warriors and James that defined half a decade of NBA basketball. Golden State looks to repeat in 2022-23 after bringing back their core six players. The Lakers, on the other hand, are hoping to deal Russell Westbrook and build a legitimate roster around James and Davis, as the former enters what appears to be the twilight of his professional career.
Green and James have always had a heated on-court rivalry, though the tension appears to have softened off the court in recent years, as the two are now engaged as business associates and friends. Should they find themselves at odds at some point in the Western Conference Playoffs, however, all bets are likely off.