In a chat with the media this week, Warriors coach Steve Kerr unleashed on anyone who was calling Steph’s leadership into question. Kerr maintains that Draymond is his own man and that treating his actions as an indictment of Steph’s character is just flat-out wrong.
“(Draymond) he’s a grown man. He’s got to handle his own business. Any mention of Steph being culpable is just ridiculous,” said Kerr via 95.7 The Game. “The way Steph has carried our franchise represented our franchise for 15 years.”
While Draymond is the one crossing the line, many around the league have taken to blaming Curry as well for failing to control and guide his teammates on the court. Whether justified or not, that’s what comes with the territory of being an all-time NBA legend.
As for Draymond, while he has been known to take things too far on occasion, his latest outburst against the Magic has the entire league concerned that he might be losing his cool again. It took him roughly four minutes to get kicked from the game and his teammates were visibly frustrated as he went on and on screaming at the officials.
That outburst was just one of many for Green throughout his career and he’s made a habit out of getting on the wrong side of the referees. Most infamously, he got ejected earlier this season for sucker-punching Jusuf Nurkic in the face. That hit was so bad, it led to a lengthy suspension for Draymond which he later called a period of self-reflection.
All these weeks later, and Dray is still up to his same old tricks and some are wondering if he learned anything from his extended hiatus. Clearly, he hasn’t lost any of his nerve and the Warriors are running out of options on how to make him understand that this is not okay.
At 10th in the West this season, the margin for error has never been so slim and Green is of much better use to his team on the floor as opposed to yapping from the sidelines.
Will The Warriors Trade Draymond Green?
Last summer, Draymond had a chance to split from the Warriors and pursue a different path. As a 4x champion and expert defensive star, Green would have been welcomed anywhere, including a place like the Lakers where he could have thrived alongside LeBron James.
Instead, he chose to re-sign with the Warriors for four years, $100 million. Now that he’s under contract for the long term, Draymond was hoping to close out his career with the franchise and keep competing for rings with Curry, Klay, and head coach Steve Kerr.
But if things end badly this spring, or Green has another outburst that hurts the team, then even his place on the team may begin to be questioned.
For GM Mike Dunleavy, he already showed a willingness to make tough choices when he traded away Jordan Poole but he may face his toughest choice yet if Draymond continues to be a problem and jeopardize his availability in games.
As one of the premier defensive players in basketball, Dray would net a solid return for Golden State and whatever they get back may just be enough to jump start that team.
For now, there’s nothing the Warriors can do but hope their core can pull it together and pull off a miracle before it’s too late. But it won’t be so easy getting past the West bracket and only through the leadership of Curry do they even stand a chance.
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