A bit too far with that one, Draymond.
Draymond Green, who typically jumps on “Inside the NBA” as a guest analyst when his Warriors season is over, took a low blow at NBA legend Charles Barkley on Wednesday night.
“Sports are for young people. You hope to have a great, long career, but nobody wins when they’re 37, 38,” Barkley said on the ESPN show.
“I think the goal is just to not look like you in the Houston Rockets uniform,” Green replied.
Barkley spent the final four seasons his Hall of Fame career with the Rockets from 1996-2000, battling injuries while not scoring like had in the past.
When co-analyst Kenny Smith asked what that meant, Green doubled down on the statement.
“Did you see it? I saw it,” Green said.
Fox Sports television host Nick Wright detested the segment.
“Aside from the fact that this is awful, awkward television, it’s also just ahistorical,” Wright said before crushing Green’s argument.
The Rockets went 57-25 in Barkley’s first season, grabbed the second seed in the Western Conference and were eliminated by the Jazz in six games in the conference finals, though many think they would have advanced to the NBA Finals had Barkley not been injured at the end of that series.
Injuries began to pile up on Barkley from there, as he played just 62 of a possible 164 games in his final two years in the league in his age-36 and age-37 seasons, respectively.
He still averaged a double-double in each season, averaging 16.5 points and 12.2 rebounds per game, although his points average marked Barkley’ lowest output with any of his three teams.
Even in Barkley’s toughest season in Houston, though, he averaged 14.5 points and 10.5 points per game, which clears Green’s career-highs for any season.
“Draymond continues to recreate history,” Wright said.
Green, 36, was between the ages of six-year-old and 10-year-old when Barkley played the backend of his career with a Rockets team that included aging Hall of Famers Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler.
Green has become increasingly hostile when discussing his NBA career, as he’s also embroiled in a war of words with former NBA player Austin Rivers, the son of Doc Rivers.
The Warriors forward, a second-round pick in the 2012 NBA Draft out of Michigan State, where he also played some college football, has previously said that Steve Kerr didn’t make his career, as many think.
“As much as he’s done for me in basketball, a part of me thinks he’s hindered me in my career and what I could have become,” Green said.
Rivers clapped back at him, saying that he was “disrespectful” to Kerr and his situation.
“You were the luckiest basketball player, I think I’ve ever seen,” Rivers said. “You were drafted to a franchise with a Hall of Fame front office, Hall of Fame coach, the greatest shooter of all time and perhaps a top-five player of all time. Not to mention one of the most lethal scorers of all time and arguably a top-10 player of all time, Kevin Durant — the same guy you chased off because you talk too much. Steve Kerr made your career. How dare you?”
When looking forward to next season, Green added that Jimmy Butler was going to miss a big chunk of the campaign, as will Moses Moody, which represents $75 million of their payroll.
“The goal is always to compete at a championship standard … as you get older, you have to redefine what success is,” Green concluded. “Still the most sellouts in the NBA. Still, the most nationally televised games in the NBA. And you just want to give yourself a chance.
“Success might not be, at this point, a championship. That’s the way it goes.”
