What's up, everybody. Welcome back to the Draymond Green Show.
We are recording this after Game two, the Doves tied the series up one to one. Fun night, Let's get right into that. Doves beat the Lakers one twenty seven to one hundred. Killer Clay Thompson came out and had a big night, thirty points on eleven for eighteen, shooting at eight for eleven from three. Always very rarely does Clay have a really big game, and we lose Steph as well. But those two guys, you know, I've you see like guys like breaking like records and scoring records
and stuff. And I always tell guys very like oftentimes Stephan Clay don't really break scoring records because usually when they are on the verge of doing something special like that, we usually win going away, and so then they end up not playing again. And like it's been like that
for years. I'm not even talking about tonight. I'm just saying in years past, for instance, Clay has sixty through three quarters, most people would then play that fourth quarter and get however many more points, right, Like, that's kind of been a thing as long as I've been here with those two guys, and tonight, you know, Clay got off to a great start, continued it on through the night. He was very pissed off after last game, and I had no doubt in my mind that he would come
out and have a big game. Clay, as you all may or may not know, Clay is from southern California, grew up a Lakers fan. Dad played for the Lakers, dad works for the Lakers and tea on TV now. His dad is the great Michael Thompson, for those that don't know, was the number one picking the draft out of Minnesota. One championship or a couple championships with the Lakers. And so I said all that to say, this really means a lot to Clay. Obviously, it means a lot
to all of us. We are playing the playoffs versus the Lakers, Lebron, that whole thing. But you know, there are just some circumstances that makes things. I always tell you all, like the whole cliche of oh, every game is the same as bullshit, Like that's not true. And so there's just certain things that may make a game or series mean a little more. And I think this is one of those with Clay and on the flip
side of that. No one ever really talks about the other side of that coin, which is you get overly emotional, you start pressing. Sometimes you know you want it so bad, and sometimes when you want something so bad, it doesn't go your way. And I thought one big thing for Clay today was he just came in the game. He settled right in, I mean settled right in the game, was kind of at peace, and things flowed this way
from the get go. Didn't want it so much, although we know he wants it so much, and I thought that was a really big deal. He was super patient and got the shots that he wanted to get and they went down, which was huge for us. Steph finished the game with twenty and twelve twelve assists, which was his most assist in the playoff game since twoenty and fourteen.
I blame me for that being his.
Most assists in the playoff game since twenty fourteen. Nonetheless, I thought he was absolutely incredible. Only had twenty points. Only had twenty points, but I thought the way he controlled the tempo of the game, took care of the basketball, got us into everything we wanted to get into was huge.
That played right before the half.
When I got the dunk, he almost like invited the trap, like he saw them come in to trap them, and it's like a second there where it looks like he's about to get off the ball and he just holds it and like invited it almost and got me a dunk. But just I'm more so speaking on that and just saying like how poised he was with everything, like super under control, knew exactly what he wanted to get to. And I thought it was absolutely incredible to watch Steph play the floor game that he played tonight.
It was huge.
Shout out to my man j Mike Jamichael Green had a huge game, fifteen points.
He got the start. Looon was a little under the other today.
So Loon only played maybe twelve minutes or something, which you go in the film, you walk in the gym and you see cavon Looney like.
Whoa.
Me and Steph looked at each other like, yo, whoa, Now we need Loon. And so to find that out literally when we're at the gym preparing for the game, it throws a ranch into things. And you know, we had a conversation with coach. Coach asks me and Steph, what do we think as far as who started, we both like, Yeah, J Mike for sure. Like J Mike gonna bring some toughness. He obviously can space the floor. He just he played in last game so he kind of got the feel of the series already.
J Mike for sure.
And J Mike finished with fifteen points and two assists in thirteen minutes. Earlier in the year, uh in February, when J Mike was just getting back from injury, we spoke about J Mike on the podcast, very similar to tonight, I'll let you hear that shout out to Jamichael Green.
J Mike came out splashing.
From everywhere, four to four, from three to five to five, from the field, fourteen points. I'm looking forward to Jamichael continuing to get more and more minutes. I really think he'll He's going to be a huge help to us, and he's starting to really show why it was so important that we wanted to go and get him, because he brings a certain physicality to our team that we need and a certain dog mindset. So yeah, and listening to that, it's along those same lines we needed J Mike.
He brought the physicality from the gate which we needed to meet force with force, and starting this game, he brought physicality and he knocked shots down and we all know how capable he is of shooting the basketball. He was huge tonight and we're gonna continue to need him as this series goes on. That's a very big team. They have a lot of size, a lot of lane. J Mike was huge for us. I'm happy he had the game that he had, and most importantly, I'm happy he stayed locked in.
You know, so many times you see guys let.
Go of the rope when they're not playing, and you know, we've been telling him all year, like hey man, we're gonna need you and we just need you to stay ready because it happens like this every year where you're gonna need guys that you may not have leaned on as much all year, you're gonna need them in the most important moment since tonight was one of those, nice especially with Loun going down and JA Mike answered the bell. So shout out to J Mike. Let's keep it going,
my brother. Y'all make sure y'all show that man some love, because it's not easy going from a guy who's played, you know, throughout his career and then all of a sudden, you're not playing much true professional way to stay locked in j Mike, that was huge and then yours truly had eleven, eleven and nine. Man, it would have been
nice to get a triple double. Huh, another playoff triple double would have been nice, and saying that we had the game under our control and I was not about to go out there and try to chase after a triple double. Doing things like that usually doesn't end well. And if you're supposed to get a triple double, you will get a triple double and it'll happen.
So I'm not worried about that at all.
My job on defense tonight was to guard a d which is never an easy job as always a tall task. You know, got him to miss some shots with you know, just really wanted to make sure I was getting a contest and if he hit shots, you have to live with that. Ad is a great player, as we all know. Future Hall of Famer, NBA Champion, Perennial All Star, you name it, both ends of the floor. Absolutely incredible player, and I think my mindset was just to make it
tough on him. No secret sauce, no like, It's just a make him take tough shots. If you can make a guy take tough shots, you have to live with the results because a guy like that, like you don't shut down great players like Anthony Davis. You just tried to make them take tough shots, and you live with the results. And I think we did a lot better job on him to night. He finished with eleven seven and four. Last game he had thirty twenty three and five.
So it was obviously well known that we needed to do a much better job on Ad coming into this game.
And I can't take all the credit for that.
So when your guarding a guy like that, it's a complete team effort, and you know, our guys did the job collectively, and we were able to get a d to have a tough night. Bron had it going. I'm not sure what Bron finished with, but he had it going. He had it going from three He hit the three off off the backboard with the shot clock running down from about thirty thirty five feet out or something. Absolutely had it gone. I was was great to see us
whether that storm. He came out extremely aggressive and we weathered the storm and was able to get stops when we needed it and open the game up. But you know, we're going to continue to expect to see a very aggressive Lebron James, especially heading back to LA and Crypto Arena. So you know, we'll be prepared to try to meet that force with force and go on this road and try.
To get it done. And that's gonna be a big key.
As far as the Lakers adjustments go, I thought, you know, or we made adjustments as well. I mean, the one adjustment that was clearly obvious was you know, me guard and a D what will you know? You always when you're in these playoff series, you always try to figure out like what will the other team's adjustment be? You know, because this as I've told y'all this, when you get in these series, man, it's it's a game of adjustments.
It's a chess match to coach.
You know, coach throws pawd out there, not necessarily throwing the queen out there, but we may throw a pound out there to get taken, may even throw a rook or a bitch ab out there at times to get taken. Ultimately trying to set up the board. And that is
what these playoffs be. You saw in full force last series when it was the Kings and Mike Brown, who knows us very well, and him and Steve playing chess, and and one as a basketball fan, absolutely fun to watch, just like the chess pieces and the moves that were being made. I absolutely enjoyed it. And and most importantly for me, I learned. I learned from it. You watch these coaches do this, I learned from it. I've been
learning so much from Steve this year. It's been a real pleasure and playing for Steve and learning not only the x's and those things, but Steve has taught me more about winning. Like I think I've always been a winning my whole life, but Steve Kerr has won at a level that not many people in NBA history, like Steve Curry is along the lines almost of Bill Russell when it comes to winning in the NBA. I think Bill Russell finished with what eleven rings in total or
something like that. Obviously Steve's aren't all as a player or but he's got nine rings, like He's literally up there with Bill Russell, like and so one of the greatest winners we've ever seen. And I have learned so much from him about winning, how to win, how do you go about it.
It's no coincidence. It is not a coincidence.
And I'm thankful for Steve and his brilliance and most important, his winning mentality and winning ways, because just like losers rub off on people, winners rub off on people.
And We've had.
The luxury of having one of the best winners in NBA history rolling with us. And I'm trying to learn as much as I can for it as long as I can, because it doesn't only help you in basketball.
Winning is winning in anything, and it'll help you in life.
It helps me in life, and so I'm very thankful for Steve and just being able to watch him do this thing. It's absolutely incredible. And Suarez Game three goals. Obviously, we're headed the Crypto Arena. I expect it to be a crazy environment. Number One, you know the star is going to be out Steph Curry versus Lebron James at Crypto Arena on a Saturday. Stars will be out and you gotta love it. You gotta embrace it. That's the big stage. Got to embrace it. Know they're going to
come out just lost bout twenty seven points. They're going to come out bouncing off the wall. They're going to come out throwing blows, and you have to stand in there and take that first blow, and you may have to stand in there and take another one, but you more importantly, you gotta.
Make sure you're responding and not getting out a character.
And I think that'll be big for us, as we had to crypto in Los Angeles and try to take care of business. The goal is always you have to go get one, be that we lost home court advantage, but I'll not get greedy and try to get two.
But let's start with one first.
Let's start with one on Saturday, looking forward to that game, expecting an extremely physical Lakers team ready to go back in front of their home fans. So looking forward to that. Everybody, make sure y'all locked into that game. And now, as we said last time, congratulations Joel Embiid on winning the MVP.
Joe Well, mb I was so wrong on last podcast.
I said Joel probably won't come back to Game three because.
They stole one, and like.
I was so wrong, I was right though, which is I still don't think he should have come back. He played twenty seven minutes and he was not as assertive on the offensive end as Joel normally is that's due to a couple of things. Number One, he could possibly not a well we know he's not one hundred percent healthy. But also you come back your team just won, and you kind of feel like you don't want to get in the way of that.
Another thing, the emotions of winning the MVP. It's tough.
And another reason why I would have kept Joel out of the lineup if I was the Philadelphia seventy six ers is because now Joel's going to go home and he's going to be handed the MVP trophy right before the game, and that changes the emotions of the game.
Like I've been a part of those games where a guy get an MVP trophy on Steph Curry, and it just changes your emotions like not him, like everybody, Like it's just like whoa, Like you have the super big moment, like winning the MVP is insane, and you have like this super big moment and then you're.
Like, oh, we're gonna go play a basketball game. Now.
It's not easy. It's very hard. It's very, very very hard, and so now they'll be faced with that. But another reason I didn't think they would would have or should have brought Joel back in game two.
It's just because like you did your job, you won one.
That's three or four more days of rest that he could have and then coming back home. Yes, you do have the crazy emotions with winning MVP, but now you know, with a guy that's coming off an injury, he may need that extra boost of emotions, you know what I'm saying, Like and so you know, to kind of get them over the hump and saying all of that, I expect Joel and Be to have a super dominant Game three. But give credit to the Celtics. Man they responded. I
knew they would respond that way. They're they're you know, they're a team that's shooting, gunning to get a championship, and they were locked in. Jason Tatum has seven points and they won by thirty. Jaylen Brown came out getting it done. Malcolm Brogden has been getting it done. Got to give a lot of credit to Malcolm Brogden. Whateverbody stepped up, and like I said, Marcus Smart, everybody stepped up, and that was to be expected. They also did a
great job of containing James Harden. James Harden had a very tough night and in turn, their team had a tough night, So looking forward to seeing how that one goes on the next go around.
Next game, Jackson, when is that next game?
I know?
You know, Uh game is Friday, and.
He gonna give up as if he don't, as if it's not locked into his calendar. Come on, now, we know, we all know Jackson is a big town Celtics fan. And this guy just gave us because I called him out on knowing when the game is, He's going to act like he did not know when the game Friday.
Which is tomorrow tomorrow.
Wow, these days are flying by. Wow, Friday tomorrow. All right, Well, when you all hear this the here's tonight, Jackson, they'll hear it.
I mean they'll hear Friday. Oh, well you'll hear this Friday, so today today.
But I'm looking forward to Philly going home and seeing how they respond to losing Game two the way they did. Teams usually come back ready to go after losing a playoff game like that.
Like I said, as.
I'm expecting the Los Angeles Lakers as well, but that serious is shaping out to be a going and of course we expected that, so looking forward to that. Also seeing looking forward to see how Joel bounce back and can he get over that hump. And then you have the Knicks in Miami headed to Miami, expecting to see Jimmy Butler back out there a little differently than these other two. Miami may have given Game two away and not like punted like gave it away like probably should
have won. Yet Jaylen Brunson showed up and they had a big game and they won Game two. And you gotta get those guys a lot of credit. They're going now, they got it. Now they gotta go get one on the road. Big weekend in Miami. Also F one be interesting to see if guys get caught up and is moving into Miami streets. It's already a lot in Miami. Got F one weekend. It's a lot going on. Carbone major food group. They've gone and taken over Miami. But they New York guys. Are they gonna have the New
York Knicks out in that car Bone beaching? Ah, we shall see if guys can stay locked in. But that series is tied up at one to one. Jackson had this stat for me. He said, the Warriors made his sixteen straight teams that dropped game one at home and then won game two, and he said, why do I think that is? And I'm here to tell you I have no idea, I have no clue why that is, no idea, But what I will tell you is let's go win game one on their court. And that's the
most important thing until next show. Until next time. That's a raph from the Draymond Green Show.
Peace