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A COVID-19 outbreak has led to a topsy-turvy December in the NBA, and Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green voiced his frustration with how the league has handled the disruptions.
These are unprecedented situations as the league has not had to play through a pandemic in the past. Of course, a few feathers will be ruffled.
The NBA has postponed games due to COVID-19 outbreaks when a team is not able to field the minimum amount of players (eight). To avoid those situations, the league has allowed teams to sign hardship exceptions, and veterans like Isaiah Thomas, Mario Chalmers and Joe Johnson have returned on 10-day contracts.
LeBron James of the LA Lakers even joked about signing Metta Sandiford-Artest with the way players are going into the league's health and safety protocols.
While several teams are bringing in players via hardship exceptions to stay competitive, the Denver Nuggets have opted not to and now have fewer than eight active players. As a result, the league postponed Golden State's Thursday night game in Denver.
The news of the postponement was not pleasing to Green's ears, and he took to the social media platform Twitter to make his point known. Following the news of the postponement, he said:
"How do you continue to cancel games when you’ve implemented rules to prevent this from happening? Is that not a competitive advantage for other teams? The guys we didn’t have due to the protocol list played no role in Tuesday's loss? Pick a side but don’t straddle the fence."
"So when the game is rescheduled (which will probably take a day away from our “break”), we will play them at full strength … But they got to sneak a win when we weren’t at full strength, only two days ago??? Let’s make it make some sense here."
Green could argue the Warriors were nowhere close to being healthy but played regardless in an 89-86 home loss to Denver.
Some have called for the NBA to pause the season, but so far the league is still in crisis management mode and is working to ensure they play for as long as possible.
Draymond Green has been dependable for the Warriors
The Warriors have been scintillating all season and are atop the Western Conference standings with a 27-7 record. Although much of that success is attributed to Stephen Curry's shooting, and rightly so, Draymond Green has played a crucial part on both ends of the court.
The stat sheet does not do Green any justice, as the majority of what he does never shows up in the box score. Nonetheless, the reason the Warriors are ranked first in defensive rating is largely because of him.
If screens were to count as assists, Green would probably lead the league in assists, considering the number of screens he has set for Curry to knock down 3-pointers. Regardless, he has provided the most assists for Steph on his way to Curry becoming the best shooter in NBA history.
Green is averaging 8.4 points, 7.9 rebounds, 7.5 assists, 1.4 steals, and 1.2 blocks per game. He is also in the conversation for the Defensive Player of the Year award.
Guess the Lakers players!
