It’s been a trying season for the Golden State Warriors. The team is 35-38 and the current holders of the 10th seed in the West, which, considering they lost Jimmy Butler for the year back in mid-January and have gotten only 39 games out of Steph Curry and 42 out of new arrival Al Horford, is a minor miracle.
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Still, the Warriors aren’t used to being an under .500 team, especially guys like Draymond Green and Steve Kerr who have experienced so much winning throughout their careers. If Steph can make it back before the play-in gets here, the Warriors will be much more dangerous, but even then, they’ll need to win two straight games just for the right to face the defending champion Thunder in the first round.
Draymond has been one of the few constants for the team this season, and after last night’s close win over the Nets, he was asked by NBC Sports Bay Area’s Kerith Burke about how he’s finding meaning during these trying times.
“You just can’t be the guy to quit when it gets tough,” he said. “I’ve had some incredible years here, been a part of some incredible teams. Banners, all that stuff. Things are great.”
“When that stuff is happening, you want to be at the forefront of it. You want to embrace it, enjoy it, all those things. It’s great. When it goes a little left, you can’t jump off the train. You can’t walk around and pout. You can’t throw in the towel. Because what was everything you did before?” Draymond confessed.
Green went on to say that he owes it to the younger players on the team to give it all he’s got every night. He said that he’s seen “frontrunners” during his time in the league, and once they show that they don’t have what it takes to push through the tough times, they can’t get back that respect that they’ve lost. He couldn’t sleep at night if he let that happen to himself.
Green is an unconventional star, someone who doesn’t stuff the stat sheet but still had an undeniable impact on all the banners the Warriors have won. His numbers are nothing to write home about this season either, even in the usage vacuum that exists without Steph and Jimmy, but he probably deserves more credit for helping to keep such a hobbled team out of the lottery.
Guys like Brandin Podziemski and Gui Santos have stepped up in the absence of the team’s stars. Santos scored 31 to help lead a fourth-quarter comeback last night, just two nights after Moses Moody went down with a serious knee injury.
The Warriors may go down this year, but they’ll at least go down fighting thanks to Green’s never-quit attitude.
