Unlike many of his All-Star teammates, Draymond Green isn’t a guy that will light up the stat sheet. In fact, throughout the course of a game, a casual fan might even forget he’s there.
But Draymond makes an impact in other ways, in ways often not countable by traditional metrics. As a defensive juggernaut, elite playmaker, and emotional leader of the team, Dray has his fingerprints all over the organization.
Matt Barnes Says The Warriors Would Have Won No Championships Without Draymond Green
And according to Matt Barnes, they wouldn’t be champions without him. During an appearance on Club Shay Shay, the former NBA swingman got real on Draymond’s value to the Warriors and spoke on the often-overlooked impact he has on the game.
“He’s the heart and soul of that organization,” Barnes said. “Of that city. And I only knew it from the outside looking in but once I got there you could clearly see it. He’s not the best player on the team, but this team wins no championships without Draymond Green. That’s just facts and I think if you ask Steph and Klay that, they’ll say the same thing. He does so many things, whether it be offensively getting guys the ball in the right spots and guys organized like a quarterback there. Or being a 6-6 Defensive Player of the Year that can cover for everyone else’s mistakes. Just his energy. He walks that fine line and sometimes he crosses it but that’s what makes him Draymond. So when he goes to the HOF, people are gonna be talkin, that motherf— averaged 8 pts, 8 reb and 8 ast, how is he in the HOF?’… The stat sheet won’t tell the whole story.”
Draymond might not look like it, but his importance to the Warriors is crucial, and everyone on the team knows it.
“Dray had to get our trust back and he was very willing to do so. Without Draymond we’re not the Warriors and without JP we’re not the Warriors,” said Klay Thompson. “JP is our future, Dray is a legend — he’s going to have a statue outside one day. Brothers fight and we spend more time with each other than with our families. We butt heads sometimes and we’ll move past it and we’re just set on repeating. You know how hard the encore is, and I know we can do it.”
While we will never know for sure how the Warriors would have fared without Dray, we do know that his game and personality have become a big part of the Warriors’ identity.
And without all that he brings to the table, even the Warriors might have a hard time making up for it.
