How valuable is Draymond Green in the springtime of an NBA playoff season?
Let us count the ways.
14.9 points per game.
9.1 rebounds per game, tied for tenth overall in the league in the postseason.
7.3 assists per game, seventh overall in the league in the postseason.
2 steals per game, eighth overall in the league in the postseason.
2.6 blocks per game, third overall in the league in the postseason..
51.1 percent from three-point range, best in the league in the postseason for any player with over 40 attempts.
And yet, all of those dazzling digits pale compared to his most valuable statistic of all: Zero flagrant foul points through two rounds of the playoffs.
If, indeed, as many have surmised, the 2016-17 playoff season is the “Draymond Green Seeks and Destroys/Draymond Green Achieves Total Vengeance/Draymond Green Clears His Name” tour, it’s a smash hit so far.
We are not yet at the one-year anniversary of last year’s NBA Finals, when the darkest moment of Green’s career came at the worst possible time: A suspension from Game 5 of the NBA Finals after the league ruled his swipe at LeBron James’ groin was a Flagrant 1. That gave Draymond four flagrant foul points, triggering a league-mandated suspension. He had already accumulated one point tossing Houston’s Michael Beasley to the ground in the first round; two more when he booted Oklahoma City’s Steven Adams in the family jewels in the Conference finals; and then triggered the suspension with LeBron.
The rest is history, but if you need to have wounds ripped open to properly motivate yourself: During Game 5, Draymond sat in a luxury box next door to Oracle with general manager Bob Myers and now-Raiders RB Marshawn Lynch (the A’s beat the Rangers, 14-5, as Khris Davis and Josh Phegley homered, as you Stomper-heads surely remember) and the Warriors lost a chance to clinch the NBA Finals in a stunning 112-97 stumble at home.
You know what happened from there.
For a year, Draymond Green has waited, played, waited, played, waited, played and waited to play for his chance at redemption. The only possible redemption is an NBA championship. The Warriors are halfway there.
But more important, Green figures to be around for it this time.
Through eight games, Draymond has only accumulated one technical foul and, as mentioned above, zero flagrant foul points. That means Draymond is on a course of correction. That means Draymond is doing that most human of endeavors: he is working at improving himself. That means Draymond, probably fueled by sleepless nights and a raging fire of regret in his soul, has made this 2016-17 postseason his “Princess Bride” Inigo Montoya moment.
“My name is Draymond Green. I killed the Warriors’ chances for a championship last year. Now, all teams in my way this year must prepare to die.”
As the Christopher Guest character in “Princess Bride” told Montoya, “you’ve got an overdeveloped sense of vengeance … that’s going to get you in trouble some day.” Draymond’s detractors often say the same thing.
Spoiler alert: It didn’t get Montoya in trouble, in the end. And halfway through the playoffs, it hasn’t gotten Green into trouble. Yet.
Eight more wins await. The basketball he’s playing is undeniably brilliant, all-time, all-around greatness in peak moments. Now, the test is for Draymond Green to finish the job, both physically and emotionally.
