Draymond Green has been fined over $905,000 in his 10-year career, per Spotrac, and he could be inching closer toward $1 million after Wednesday night’s postgame comments.
During Golden State’s 99-82 loss to the Mavericks in Dallas, Green picked up a technical foul during a timeout. After the game, he explained that referee Marat Kogut walked way from him as Green tried to explain himself. When Kogut eventually returned, Green similarly turned his back on the official, leading to the technical foul which Green called “disrespectful” and “bull-s***.”
Entering the 2021-22 season, Green was already one of the most technical-ed players ever, with career 131 T’s to his name. He’s gotten about eight or nine this year, he estimated, five to six of which were “super questionable.” He is a fiery, passionate player, but it’s possible his reputation is making officials quicker with their whistles.
“I’m a grown man with my own children,” Green said. “So I won’t be treated as someone else’s child that probably don’t even have as many children as I have. It’s garbage. Like I said, there’s been quite a few of them like that this year. I don’t really make any noise about it because at this point in my career, I really don’t care about getting a tech. So it kind of is what it is. But it is a shame. And that’s for certain.”
Green’s postgame, expletive-laced comments lasted nearly two minutes. He was last fined for criticizing officials in 2019, when he forked over $35,000 to the league.
Players are suspended for one game after accumulating 16 technical fouls in the regular season. Green is familiar with the rule, as his technical for kicking LeBron James in the 2016 NBA Finals infamously led to Golden State’s 3-1 series collapse.
Not only does Green have a history with technicals, but the Warriors also have a history with Kogut, the official who reprimanded Green on Wednesday. In late March of 2019, then-Warrior Kevin Durant called Kogut “the best player on the floor.” That night, Curry said Kogut was “the MVP” and suggested the official had “an agenda.”
Wednesday was just the latest example of Kogut impacting the Warriors.
“I said to the referee, ‘It’s unbelievable that you would walk away from me, very disrespectful. Mid-sentence when we were having a normal conversation. And if I walked away from you when you were talking to me, you’d give me a tech.’ He continued to walk away from me. Then he walked up to me and said, ‘Alright, what do you have to say?’ And I said, ‘Fuck it, it’s cool. I don’t even want to talk anymore.’ And walked away. Got a tech. You tell me where the tech is.”
Green insists he’s not going to stop talking. Nor should he stop, if that’s the way his technical played out in Dallas.
