The Golden State Warriors are officially back in the conference finals for the sixth time in the last eight years, and Draymond Green decided to celebrate by going after one of his favorite targets.
Speaking Friday after the Warriors eliminated the Memphis Grizzlies with a 110-96 win in Game 6 of their second-round series, Green blasted Kendrick Perkins in his postgame press conference. Perkins previously ripped Green on ESPN for being scared to shoot the ball. He had also called out Green for getting ejected from Game 1 of the series and for Green’s constant trash talk.
“Something came to my phone earlier,” said Green. “A guy saying I’m scared to shoot the basketball. Scared and me in the same sentence is, like, brutal. You got a big ogre on TV talking about, ‘What Draymond said ain’t the gospel.’ It is the gospel … When you say that multiple times on several different segments, you must think what I say [is] the gospel.
“‘Anybody can make the pass Draymond makes,’ that’s just stupid,” Green went on, responding to another Perkins criticism. “These are people who get employed to talk on TV about our game. ‘Anybody can make that pass.’ You make that pass! We’d love to see it. I played against the guy by the way. I’m talking about Kendrick Perkins for those of you that don’t know. I’m never ducking no smoke.”
Just minutes later, Perkins offered a response on Twitter. Perkins seemed most bothered by Green’s “ogre” comment and fired back at Green saying, “You ain’t handsome! You damn sure ain’t cute!”
To his credit at least, Green attempted a playoff-high 14 shots on Friday. He connected on six of them to finish with 14 points on top of 15 rebounds and eight assists.
As for Green’s vendetta against Perkins, it dates back several years. When Perkins was still playing for the Cleveland Cavaliers, Green got into it with him during an NBA Finals battle. The fireworks have not let up ever since Perkins joined ESPN either. Perkins seems to criticize Green every chance he gets, and Green even fired back at him after winning a gold medal with Team USA last summer.
More must-reads: