DRAYMOND GREEN NEEDS TO BE KICKED OUT OF THE NBA ALREADY!!!

I’ve always hated insane Draymond Green, a basketball player on the Golden State Warriors. I began writing an article about his new-at-that-time evildoing at the beginning of the 2022-23 season, (so a bit over a year ago,) and then I figured he’s a lost cause, so I decided against wasting any more of my time or brain power on him.

And then he got even more dangerous this week. So I decided that enough is enough. I have to stick my two cents into the discussion of what to do about him! (And, by the way—even all the basketball analysts and commentators are telling it like it is now!)

If you’re interested, you can read the exact details of the latest harm he did to an opposing player, (and, actually, himself, but perhaps even moreso, to his team,) this past week, all over the web.

But the main gist is that Green put an opposing player, Rudy Gobert of the Minnesota Timberwolves, in…a chokehold! If Rudy’s teammates and the referees hadn’t stepped in in time, Draymond could have literally killed Rudy!!!

And, in case you’re wondering, Rudy had done nothing wrong. Two different players, one from each team, had gotten into a serious skirmish, and Rudy was one of the many trying to separate them. And then Draymond ran over and put Rudy right into a chokehold, for no reason other than that he’s a violent bully who should not be allowed in team sports. I’ve never seen anything like it. (And hope to never do so again.)

I’m glad that the NBA suspended the villain for five games, which is more than many pundits thought they’d give him, but much less than they, and I, think he deserved.

Suspensions are based primarily on the current offense(s), but the league is supposed to also take the offender’s pattern of bad behavior into account. Since Draymond is always committing some heinous act or other, he needs to finally get taught a hard lesson, which just five games without pay definitely does not do.

The league really needed to do the right thing now, and suspend Draymond Green for a loooooong time, at least as long as they did Ja Morant at the beginning of this season. Ja is a young, (and great—much better and more valuable to his team than Green is,) player for the Memphis Grizzlies. He’s an idiot who flashed a gun in videos last year—twice! The NBA Commissioner, Adam Silver, had a talk with Ja after the first incident. Adam thought Ja got it, and then there he was, just a few months later, doing it again.

So Morant rightly received a twenty-five game suspension for the two incidents, which he was stupid enough to post videos of on social media.

But—I repeat—Draymond Green put a fellow player in a CHOKEHOLD, for goodness sake! And guess what? That was not his first incident of the week! Just a couple of days before, he had pushed popular Cleveland Cavalier, (and one of my favorite players,) Donovan Mitchell, in the back, in a decidedly cheap shot. As commentator Kendrick Perkins said on TV, there’s no one in the entire league who has a problem with Donovan!!! Except, apparently, Draymond, who has a problem with everyone except the one person who deserves it—himself!

As Perkins suggested, (which he himself had to do back in the day,) the league should make Green go to mandatory Anger Management classes. That’s better than where I think he should go—to prison! What he did to Rudy is felony assault, in my book.

As former player, Joe Dumars, who is now the Executive Vice President of the NBA, explained, Draymond had escalated the on-court altercation “in an unsportsmanlike and dangerous manner.”

Draymond Green is known to be one of the dirtiest players in NBA history, if not the top one. He’s kicked or punched opponents, (including LeBron James, whose Cavs were beating the Warriors in the 2016 NBA Finals,) in the family jewels several times.

Green not only kicked Steven Adams, of the Oklahoma City Thunder, in that tender region twice, but also once yanked the guy’s shoulder so hard that, had Adams not been a physical behemoth, it would have surely separated!

But wait–there’s more! So much more.

In last season’s play-offs, Green literally stomped on the chest of Domantas Sabonis of the young and happening Sacramento Kings. Domantas had fallen to the floor, and Green did his dirty deed as he ran back up to his team’s basket. On purpose.

He either thinks that no one sees what he does, or he’s just a psychopath who doesn’t care. I think it’s the latter, partly because he never shows remorse. Or apologizes. To anyone, including his teammates. Or even admits to what he did. He usually goes on his podcast the next day, says it’s the other players’ faults, and laughs about the evil he’s done!

And, at the very beginning of last season, he sucker-punched his own teammate, Jordan Poole, right in the mouth! Besides how evil that is, it ruined the team dynamics for the entire season!

Basketball great Charles Barkly once said of Draymond Green, “I just want someone to punch him in the face.” I agree. And then Green got even uglier than he already is. He was so nasty to Charles after that, but Charles wound-up seeming to be okay with Green down the line. TNT has even let Draymond join their in-studio show to comment on games when the Warriors were knocked-out of the play-offs, which is disgusting of them. I believe he’s still under contract to join the panel when he retires from playing, but TNT really needs to fire him, pronto.

Just to show you that the league does not punish Draymond Green sufficiently, here are two more comparisons, to go with the Morant one above.

Last year, Miles Bridges of the Charlotte Hornets got charged with domestic violence* following an alleged incident with the mother of his children. He pled no contest to it, and the NBA suspended him for thirty games. While domestic violence* is abhorrent, violence upon a fellow basketball player should be taken as seriously by the NBA. Draymond Green should have received at least as long a suspension as Bridges did. *[Note: Yes, I’m sure the league has a strong policy against domestic violence, but they should also have one about any violence, especially against a fellow player!]

On a lesser note, right before the 2022-2023 season, it came out that unmarried, (but engaged,) Celtics’ head coach, Ime Udoka, had engaged in a consensual affair with a woman who also works for the Celtics, and he got suspended* for a year, (and fired by the Celts.) Around that same time is when Draymond Green fully punched his teammate Poole, and he was simply fined. For violence, as opposed to just a sexual affair. Crazy. *[Note: I believe the team is who suspended Udoka, as opposed to the league, but it all seems to go hand-in-hand.]

One good thing that’s come out of this chokehold sitch is that the Warriors’ longtime head coach, Steve Kerr, has finally fessed-up about how out of control Draymond Green is. I used to love Steve, but for a long while, his constant sticking-up for his violent player was making me sick. I was always thinking that if Kerr was coaching against Green, he’d tell the truth about him.

But, after initially doing his usual defending of the miscreant after the incident with Gobert, Kerr finally fessed-up and said, “He took it too far. Draymond was wrong. He knows that. It’s a bad look, and the five games are deserved. I don’t have a problem with [Green] trying to get Rudy off of Klay [Thompson, the Warrior involved with the initial confrontation], but he’s got to let go. He hung on for six, seven seconds. It was a terrible visual for the league, for Draymond and for everybody.” He added, “Draymond has to find a way to not cross the line. I’m not talking about getting an ejection or a technical, I’m talking about a physical act of violence. That’s inexcusable. We have to do everything we can to give him the help and assistance he needs to be able to draw that distinction between being an incredible competitor … but he can’t cross that line. He crossed it the other night, for sure.”

I’m glad he mentioned that Green needs “help”; he most definitely does. And everyone has always seemed scared to tell him that. Now maybe the powers-that-be will finally take his on-court crimes more seriously. Before he kills someone!

I wish they’d kick him out of the NBA, but short of that, they really do need to suspend him for at least half the season.