It was among his worst NBA Finals’ ever, but Golden State Warriors’ forward Draymond Green got the last laugh. He had 12 points, 12 rebounds, eight assists, two steals, two blocks, and was +16 in the championship-clinching Game 6 in Boston. In the aftermath of his fourth NBA title Green went on a bit of a tweet storm, making it clear that he heard all the chatter. Green quote tweeted a graphic from the popular StatMuse account that highlighted the excellent defense he and teammate Andrew Wiggins played this season.
“The cuffs have been locked away due to Hot Summer months…”
The cuffs have been locked away due to Hot Summer months… https://t.co/b0esSRxHEJ
— Draymond Green (@Money23Green) June 17, 2022
A reference to the stifling defense he and Wiggins played on Celtics’ stars Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Or a reference to the freedom he will have this summer to talk smack about the Warriors’ greatness. Either way, he and the Warriors’ earned this moment.
Jaylen Brown’s January tweet right before the Celtics turned their season around
The Warriors will use ANYTHING 🤣 pic.twitter.com/qbkXjANn8p
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) June 17, 2022
It wasn’t looking great for Green and the Warriors after Game 3 of this series. Down 2-1 they were searching for answers. The veteran champs looked rattled. The Boston crowd chanted “F*** you Draymond and were in his head.
“Game 3, it just caught me off guard,” Green said about the chants. “Like you’ve heard crowds boo, and I never heard an entire crowd yell ‘f*** you, Draymond.’ That was a different thing. And then so you couple that with having a so-so game, and it’s like, ah, man. … For me, I said what better time than to put it together tonight. I don’t think I heard ‘f*** you, Draymond’ all night. They couldn’t. So, you know, it’s easy to chant ‘f*** you’ when somebody is having a bad game, but can’t you do that when they’re having a great game? I didn’t hear much of it tonight. Maybe I was just that locked in.”
Green’s mother, Mary Babers, tweeted out she didn’t know what was going on with her son earlier in the series. But ultimately knew the stuff her son was made of, and how he would respond.
“I think he handled it very well and handled [it] better than most people had, but it still affected him. It affected him big time,” Babers told Yahoo Sports. “I think he had lost his confidence a little bit. Being an athlete, you never really experience that. Of course you get five to seven haters in the gym opposed to 20,000. But the way he bounced back was amazing. I told him to tune it all out and he did. You know they say revenge is a dish best served cold. He responded like a true champion.”
The Warriors won three straight following Game 3 and have further cemented their legacy as one of the great dynasties in NBA history.
Green and the Warriors responded after being hit in the mouth like many great champions do. They’ve earned all the accolades and adulation that comes with succeeding at the highest level, and they’ve earned the right to have the last laugh.
Get ready for the Warriors’ petty show to be going strong all over social media and podcasts this summer.
