Golden State Warriors rookie Yaxel Lendeborg certainly has a lot of personality, but it seems Draymond Green is not a fan based on his recent comments about the 11th overall pick on his podcast.
The relationship between the two seemed to start innocently enough with the two of them seeming to joust in good fun on social media over the rivalry between their two colleges.
Green's Lendeborg comments feel dangerously close to Jordan Poole
Things went further after Lendeborg made a recent pitch for LeBron James to join the Warriors, basically just saying that he knows James doesn’t love rookies, but he thinks he’s not the average rookie and that he has a great opportunity to play with Stephen Curry, the greatest shooter of all time, and his good friend in Green.
Innocent enough, right?
Not according to Draymond who said Lendeborg’s pitch was pointless on his podcast and went on to say, “I think the pitch is pointless. But it's fine. Training camp is coming soon enough, and you know, gotta rein the rookie in a little bit, you know, teach him a few things.”
Then, Lendeborg was asked to respond to Draymond’s remarks.
"I got a little nervous. I don’t know what he’s talking about, man. He could be hinting at a lot of different things. Hopefully it’s not the (rookie) hazing. I hope we keep that at a minimum. I hope it’s just like, ‘Yeah, I got you. This is what you should and shouldn’t do.’ So I’m a little worried, but hopefully everything goes well," Lendeborg said.
Perhaps this is all just overblown and the two guys are just joking around, but it’s not exactly the right message for Green to send that the rookie essentially has to be put in his place or something of that nature.
All Lendeborg did was make a pretty innocuous pitch to LeBron that he clearly only made because a reporter asked him to. He didn’t say anything crazy or out of bounds at all, yet Green made him feel like he did. Perhaps this comes from Green being insecure that Lendeborg could end replace him.
This is all becoming ominously similar to the way things played out with Jordan Poole. Green clearly has a problem with young players who like to talk and it took a very dark turn with Poole. This doesn’t mean Green is going to strike Lendeborg the way he did Poole, but it’s not hard to envision a scenario where the 23-year-old feels like he can’t be himself or doesn’t feel welcome on the team.
That would be terrible because the Warriors need Lendeborg to play at a high level if they are going to have any chance at being a contender next season. That means everyone on the team has to be on the same page playing in unison, and there can’t be any prideful veterans going after younger players over things they say to the media.
Maybe all this stuff will be papered over or Green is just playing up this narrative to get more traction for his podcast, but this is not a great start for the Warriors. Fans have seen this before and one can only hope it doesn’t get as bad as it got between Green and Poole.
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