Getty Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert on the court during a bout with the Phoenix Suns.
Chaos erupted on the Minnesota Timberwolves’ bench on Sunday night when three-time All-Star Rudy Gobert threw a punch at teammate Kyle Anderson during the club’s regular-season finale against the New Orleans Pelicans. Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green was quick to comment on the matter, too, taking a subtle Twitter jab at the Stifle Tower.
“Insecurity is always loud…’ wrote Green, a callback to Gobert tweeting the exact same sentence in the wake of the Warriors pivot’s training camp kerfuffle with Jordan Poole.
And, as if there was any question about what Green was referencing, he spelled it out for the world on the April 10 episode of his podcast.
“You should be careful when you start speaking out on things that you don’t really know,” Green said. “You start speaking out, tweeting stuff, sneak dissing… When I had an incident earlier this year, Rudy Gobert tweeted, ‘Insecurity is always loud’ — it’s just hard to say that when you don’t really know the circumstance.”
“I was 100% talking about Rudy Gobert and his incident yesterday with Kyle Anderson on the bench.”
Warriors Star Draymond Green Breaks Down the Rudy Gobert Situation
When the Timberwolves made the decision to trade Patrick Beverley, Malik Beasley, Jarred Vanderbilt, rookie Walker Kessler, four future first-round picks and more to the Utah Jazz for Gobert, many wondered whether it was a wise move for the rising squad — if it was even going to be possible to make it all work.
As Green sees it, the Gobert-Anderson blow-up exemplified the ongoing struggle to do just that.
“I’m not on that team, that’s not really for me, but it’s interesting and you had to know everyone had these questions when the trade happened of ‘How is that going to work?’ And you clog up the paint for Anthony Edwards, a young star, and so on and so forth. Last night, it probably reared its ugly head,” Green said.
While the 42-40 Wolves’ playoff hopes were already resting on shaky ground, Green believes that the punch — which has resulted in Gobert being suspended for Minnesota’s play-in game — may be too much to overcome given everything else that’s going on.
“So unfortunate to see all of those things happen at this time where you had Naz Reid get hurt a couple of weeks ago, so he’s out, got Rudy Gobert out, got Jaden McDaniels out, and you’re going into a play-in game with one of the hottest teams in the NBA that is the Los Angeles Lakers in Los Angeles. Tough, tough, tough circumstances.”
Gobert Actually Earned a Measure of Respect From Draymond
Green recounted the exchange between Gobert and Anderson in some detail, going so far as to reference a supposed audio leak from Minnesota’s locker room post-incident that seemingly depicts the latter saying that the Wolves organization does too much to placate their defensive anchor and that they would have “a decision to make this summer.”
The Warriors star further noted that Anderson looked to be calling Gobert a “b****” before the punch was thrown, opining that other players in the league have thought about that term in relation to the big man.
That said, Green confessed that Gobert earned some points in his book for not allowing the verbiage to go unchecked.
“He gained a little respect for me because he stood up for himself,” Green said. “I’ve never really seen the guy stand up for himself, so I didn’t really know if the guy was capable of standing up for himself — he stood up for himself.”
Alas, Green was careful to point out that you can’t get physical with a teammate in such a way, likening the Gobert-Anderson altercation to his own spat with Poole.
“Unfortunately, that doesn’t really work. Take it from me — I know how that goes; doesn’t quite work in that environment, but I do understand the thinking. I definitely understand the mindset… not going to get up here and act like I don’t understand the mindset. I 100% understand the mindset.”