"Your lip-reading skills are pretty accurate" - Draymond Green points out that he was handed a wrong technical with help of a Warriors reporter's lip-reading
Draymond Green was ejected from the game against the San Antonio Spurs after two technical fouls and the Chase Center crowd erupted to boo the referees. Midway through the third quarter, Green was whistled for his fourth personal foul. Clearly not agreeing with the call, he started arguing with the official and was subsequently ejected.
After the ejection, he started shouting at the referee whilst on his way to the locker room. He received a $25,000 fine for "directing profane language towards a game official" from the NBA.
Many fans didn't agree with the fine, suggesting it was unnecessary. A Golden State Warriors journalist who goes by the social media handle "Let's Go Warriors" investigated the incident and lip-read Draymond Green's words that were supposedly profane.
The following was released by the NBA. https://t.co/Icut3rX1Yr
The journalist posted a picture of the NBA's fine on his Instagram story and captioned it with his observation.
"Based on my lip-reading skills, Dray said "Come on, Man!" and (Marat) Kogut gave him the first tech. Then Dray said "That's terrible!" to Kogut a few plays later and got hit with the second T."
"Then the expletives flew as dray walked out, passing by the scorer's table. Can I get confirmation on this, anyone?...He got ejected first without saying a single expletive is what I saw."
He asked his followers if they could confirm what he observed and Draymond Green responded by authenticating the story himself. He reposted the story on his own Instagram handle and said:
"Your lip-reading skills are pretty accurate"
In his next story Draymond Green complemented the reporter behind "Let's Go Warriors" when a fan jokingly asked if he was the next "Jomboy". James Vincent Michael O'Brien, more commonly known as Jomboy, is a sports media personality who used his lip-reading skills to uncover the Houston Astros cheating scandal of 2017.
Draymond Green was ejected way before using any expletive or profane language. Green has a reputation for being a hot-head with a history of ejections and technical fouls.
Since 2015, he has been top 10 in the league in technical fouls drawn, including leading the league in that category in 2016 and 2019. Often his reputation precedes him and he is ejected or tee-d up even if he wasn't being disrespectful.
Steve Kerr on Draymond Green's ejection:
“It was unfortunate. Obviously, we need Draymond desperately. I was surprised by that… He didn’t think he deserved it.”
Draymond Green believes the Golden State Warriors are playing "soft"
The Golden State Warriors have now lost their last three games in a row and their last two losses were quite winnable affairs. They blew away opportunities down the stretch and lost against San Antonio and Orlando in crunch time.
Their schedule only gets harder from here on out and they are still operating without their talisman Steph Curry. However, they should be capable of winning such games as they have done in the past even without the services of Curry.
After losing to the bottom-table Orlando Magic, Draymond Green was quite upset with the situation the team was in. He spoke in the postgame press conference and said:
"We’re playing soft. We’re playing stupid. We’re just not playing good basketball. And we’re getting punked."
@anthonyVslaterThe Warriors have lost 12 of their last 18 games.
“We’re playing soft. We’re playing stupid.” — Draymond Green
🎥 @anthonyVslater https://t.co/cmNdSn7Hpz
The road ahead is getting tougher for the Golden State Warriors. They have the 11th-toughest schedule in the league with seven of their remaining 10 games are on the road. Moreover, these remaining 10 games feature an absurdly high four back-to-backs because their schedule is jam-packed near the end.
Bay Area fans might not see Steph Curry play until Game 1 of the first round of the playoffs, so Green and co. will have to pull up their socks and win the majority of the games moving forward. They are at high risk of falling to the fourth seed in the conference if they don't salvage the remainder of the season.
They are just two games ahead of the 4th-placed Jazz, with Utah holding the tie-breaker as it leads its division.
The Warriors continue their road trip with the next stop at Miami. They then take on the Hawks, Wizards and Grizzlies before returning home to take on the league-best Phoenix Suns.