Paul Pierce has lived through some amazing moments through his 19-year NBA career. He went toe-to-toe with Kobe Bryant, won an NBA championship and received plenty of other accolades. However, arguably his most viral moment came during his final season in the NBA. Unfortunately, it wasn’t one of his finest as Draymond Green was trash talking him. Several years after the fact, Pierce reveals his side of things.
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Paul Pierce will always be a Boston Celtics legend. However, the last four seasons of his career featured stints with three different teams; the Brooklyn Nets, Washington Wizards and Los Angeles Clippers. In his final NBA season with the Clippers, he was far from his former All-Star self.
Pierce announced the 2016-17 NBA season would be the last of his career. It would’ve been amazing if he were able to receive a farewell tour similar to Bryant. Of course, Pierce was at a different stage of his career than the Los Angeles Lakers legend. While Bryant was a starter in his final year, Pierce came off the bench, averaging just 11.1 minutes per game.
Regardless, he still brought his experience and leadership to a Clippers team looking to compete for a championship. In a game against the Golden State Warriors, Pierce wanted to ignite a fire within his team, but could have never anticipated what would come from that decision.
“Golden State Warriors were like the big brother to the Clippers,” Pierce said on Club Shay Shay. “I’m coming over there like the OG. Y’all ain’t about to be punking us.”
At the time, the Clippers still had a core consisting of Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan. Pierce understood that if Griffin got going, Los Angeles would be difficult to stop, so that’s what he tried to do.
“I’m trying to put a battery in Blake because Draymond is trying to go at Blake, but Blake’s an All-Star too. And [Draymond] was like, ‘Shut up, you ain’t Kobe. I guess I didn’t hear until after the game because he said it under the basket where the mic picked it up, so everybody on TV heard it,” Pierce revealed.
It didn’t help that the internet would turn Pierce into the laughing stock of the league shortly after. However, the NBA legend doesn’t hold any animosity toward Green in the slightest. “I give it to Draymond. He’s one of the all-time trash talkers. He got me,” Pierce proclaimed.
It’s great that Pierce can laugh about it now rather than hold a grudge. Greatness recognizes greatness, which is exactly what Pierce has been able to do.
