Draymond Green gave a candidly hilarious explanation for why he can’t jaw at Klay Thompson anymore as a senior Warriors player.
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Klay Thompson and Draymond Green share a really close connection as pillars of the Warriors dynasty. While Klay Thompson is the ultimate 3-and-D swingman – possibly the greatest of all time in that role – Draymond is the voice of the locker room.
As the vocal leader of the group, Green often has to resort to harsh words and criticism. This is not a new role for him – Steve Kerr empowered him to be what he is today when he took over the reins of the team.
Often, Klay would be at the receiving end of Green giving an earful to his teammates. Draymond got to talking about this:
“For years, we were the young guys on the team. So the only guy I really could yell at was Klay. No one else would listen to me. Everybody else was way older than us. Now Klay’s the old guy, can’t yell at him anymore.”
The bond between Draymond Green and Klay Thompson
Klay is a month older than Draymond, and was drafted a year earlier (in 2011-12). Draymond was picked by Mark Jackson for his ability to guard rangy players. But Green did not get much of a run under him – people believed he might even have to carve an overseas career.
But under Steve Kerr, the regime change affected Draymond Green positively. Kerr installed a motion offense that maximized Draymond’s ability to make the right basketball play. Green began starting games midway through the 2014-15 season, and the Warriors took off.
They made 5 straight Finals runs together, winning 3 championships along the way. While the headlines were grabbed by Iguodala, Steph and KD, these two were the bread and butter of the team. They were the infallible horses who played at a high level on both ends of the floor.
