The ultimate collapse of the Golden State Warriors dynasty, one that featured Kevin Durant for three seasons, seemingly can be traced back to one argument between two stars, Draymond Green and Durant.
It was a late-game situation against the Clippers in which Green made a bad play which was followed by a heated conversation between the two. Clearly, it was Durant who felt he should’ve had a chance at the final shot.
The Warriors hit Draymond Green with a one-game suspension back in the 2018-2019 season, and he apparently laughed at the Dubs franchise for it.
While things cooled off eventually and Durant finished the season with Golden State, nothing was truly the same, and it was rather obvious that Durant was heading elsewhere following the team’s 2019 NBA Finals loss.
Following that controversy, Green was handed a one-game suspension for his role in the argument. It really seemed more like a situation in which the Warriors were trying to appease Durant.
When the two sat down in a Bleacher Report exclusive interview for Green’s Chips series, they were able to lay out their views on that game and more importantly the situation that followed in the days to follow.
Both blamed head coach Steve Kerr and general manager Bob Myers for how it turned into Durant’s eventual exodus.
“I laughed in their, literally, laughed in their face,” Green said. Green noted that the management wanted him to apologize to Durant for how the situation got out of hand. If you’ve watched Green over the year, you knew that wasn’t going to happen.
It was a tough situation for management. As Durant referenced Scottie Pippen‘s similar controversy that was handled more by the team, he noted that it was something they needed to figure out without the need for management to intervene.
All parties clearly did what they viewed was right, and it’s a tough situation to get a grasp on and the long-term consequences it had on the franchise. Nonetheless, this was an important time for both players, management, and the team.
Regardless of how this played out, losing the 2019 NBA Finals did not help the team chemistry as Klay Thompson tore his ACL and was going to be out for the following season anyway.
Durant headed to Brooklyn, and the Warriors did the best they could to return a couple of important assets that eventually turned into rookie forward Jonathan Kuminga and Andrew Wiggins.