Last month, Draymond Green earned his seventh All-Defensive Team berth in eight seasons when he was voted onto the Second Team. Prior to a back injury that sidelined him for more than two months, Green was the presumed favorite for Defensive Player of the Year. Ultimately, he only suited up for 46 regular season games and Marcus Smart collected his first Defensive Player of the Year trophy.
Yet when Green met with reporters on Tuesday and discussed his All-Defensive honor, he expressed some confusion and frustration with the accolade.
“For me, it’s a slight,” Green said when asked how he perceived the recognition. “When I look at the first team, I am not sure I can pinpoint, definitely not five guys that had a better defensive season than me. And there are no [games played] requirements. There is not some amount that you have to play in. If there was an amount that you had to play, then I would be an idiot sitting here and saying that.”
Green joined Bam Adebayo, Jrue Holiday, Matisse Thybulle and Robert Williams III on the Second Team. Meanwhile, Smart, Jaren Jackson Jr., Rudy Gobert, Mikal Bridges and Giannis Antetokounmpo composed the First Team.
“It goes on the resume as an All-Defensive team, so I will take it,” Green said. “But I was a little shocked when the First Team and I was like, ‘Hmm, that’s interesting. Maybe I didn’t make it at all.’ But then, the fact that I made the second team, there are more than five defenders [better] … you had to totally take me off and then I’ll be like, alright, they voted on the amount of games [played].
“But it makes absolutely no sense to say, well, he was a Second Team All-Defensive player because then you can’t be taking the amount of games into consideration. And if you are taking the amount of games into consideration and say, ‘Oh this guy is Second Team,’ then you are just making stuff up.”