Veteran forward Draymond Green has vented his frustration at the NBA's Play-In Tournament, with that coming despite the fact it's the only thing keeping the Golden State Warriors alive with three games left in the regular season.
Green acknoweldged the Play-In Tournament "ain't working", while also calling out tanking teams after the Warriors' fate was sealed by the L.A. Clippers victory over the Dallas Mavericks at the Intuit Dome on Tuesday night.
Warriors fate as 10th-seed sealed after Tuesday's results
The injury-hit Warriors had sunk to the 10th-seed and were likely to remain there on the back of four-straight losses. They did break that losing streak in an unconvincing win over the Sacramento Kings at Chase Center, but the Clippers win over the Mavericks means they can't move from 10th ahead of the Play-In Tournament next week.
Green has called on the NBA to start fining tanking teams to a greater degree, noting that "we could have lost our last 15 games and been stuck in 10th." The 36-year-old has a point, with Golden State 11.5 games ahead of the 11th-ranked New Orleans Pelicans, with all of the bottom five teams prioritizing their chances come the draft lottery.
Green did quip that it has allowed the Warriors to remain with an opportunity that otherwise wouldn't have been available, but it still sounds like the former Defensive Player of the Year is no fan of the current system.
Green said the play-in tournament “worked initially and now, to have a team stuck in 10th, it ain’t working. We could have lost our last 15 games and been stuck in 10th — it ain’t working.” Later, he noted with a laugh, “We want to make the playoffs, so it works, I guess.”
— Sam Gordon (@BySamGordon) April 8, 2026
This will be the second time in three years that the Warriors have finished as the 10th-seed in the Western Conference, and they'll be hoping for better fortune than in 2024 where they were smacked by the Kings in what resulted as Klay Thompson's final game for the franchise.
Warriors have significant history with the Play-In Tournament
This will be Golden State's fourth trip to the Play-In since its official inception six years ago. They lost back-to-back games to the Los Angeles Lakers and Memphis Grizzlies in heart-breaking fashion in 2021, but Stephen Curry proved good on his vow that "you don't want to see us next year" as the Warriors climbed back to the NBA mountaintop in 2022.
They narrowly avoided the Play-In as the sixth-seed in 2023, before losing to the Kings as previously mentioned in 2024. A loss to the L.A. Clippers in the regular season finale last year condemned Golden State to the Play-In again, but they accounted for the Memphis Grizzlies to officially qualify as the seventh-seed.
Stephen Curry's return over the past two games gives the Warriors some hope heading into next week's proceedings, but winning two-straight games on the road to make the playoffs will be still be an uphill battle.