Getty Draymond Green of the Golden State Warriors in Game 2 of the NBA Finals against the Boston Celtics.
If you thought the drama between Golden State Warriors’ Draymond Green and Boston Celtics’ Jaylen Brown was over, you thought wrong. After Game 2, Brown described Green’s antics as unnecessary and typical of Green.
At the end of the first half, Brown was fouled by Green shooting a three. Both fell to the floor, and Green seemed to escalate things by having his feet on top of Brown. The Celtics guard took exception and got up right away, while Green seemingly tried to pull down Brown’s pants.
It was dangerous for Green to do, as he already had one technical foul in such a close game up to that point. Green forced the officials to make a tough decision, and they decided not to issue any technical fouls at that point.
After practice on June 7, Green acknowledged players like Gary Payton, Rick Mahorn, Rasheed Wallace, and others who would ‘muck’ up the game.
“That’s a part of the game,” Green says. “That is a skill.”
After Game 2, Celtics’ champion Cedric Maxwell talked with Supersonics’ legend Gary Payton on CLNS Media about the scuffle and he didn’t mince any words.
”Let me just say this to you, and I’m gonna be as clear as I can,” Maxwell says directly. “That s—t Draymond Green was doing? During the ’80s he would’ve got knocked the f—k out.”
Chalk it up to Maxwell sticking up for his team, but it would not be Draymond Green without a response to that, would it?
Green Claps Back at Maxwell Over His Comments About Being Knocked Out
As someone who works in the media, Green does his homework and pays attention to all the chatter that is said surrounding the Finals.
It came as no surprise to anyone that he would have a few choice words back after some aggressive comments coming from the Celtics’ legend.
“I saw what Cedric Maxwell said,” Green responds after June 8’s practice.
“One thing that baffles me about the ’80s or the ’90s, or whenever you want to call it when basketball was so much more physical, is some of the guys that be talking weren’t the guys that were punching people. They act like guys were just walking around the court, like, I’m hitting this guy in the nose.
But everybody running around acting like they were that. Y’all were getting bullied. So it baffles me when every guy, just because they played in the ’80s, just because they played in the ’90s, is like, man, if you played in our day, you’d get knocked out. No, not really, because it wouldn’t be you.”
“Y’all were getting bullied”
Draymond has a message for those who glorify the physicality of basketball in the 1980s and ‘90s 😂
Again, Green is speaking some cold hard facts. Just because the era was deemed physical and tenacious, it doesn’t mean that everyone back then was scratching and clawing each other. Green grew up in Michigan, so he had a front-row seat to how the Bad Boy Detroit Pistons played. They were considered probably the dirtiest team of the era, but like Green says, not everyone on the roster was enforcers.
Green’s Play Helped Change the Trajectory of Game 2
Some would argue that Green’s antics helped change the outcome of Game 2 against the Celtics. Up to that point, the Celtics were very much in the game, with the lead changing hands back and forth for much of the first half.
After halftime, the Dubs blew the game open in the third quarter, outscoring the Celtics 35-14. For what Green lacks as a shooter, he makes up for that with his intangibles. Sometimes it works out, and other times it doesn’t, but clearly, in Game 2 it was exactly what the Warriors needed to even the series.
Going forward in the series, it will be interesting to see how else Green can impact the series, and what the NBA allows from him.