Draymond Green does a lot of things on a basketball court, and he’ll be asked to do even more with Steph Curry sidelined. Off the court, however, he only does one thing: He keeps it real. He kept it real when a reporter asked him an inappropriate question about Houston floods, for example, and it might have gotten that reporter fired. Now that the Western Conference playoffs have become a story of injuries, he’s keeping it real about those too.
When the Warriors were at practice for Game 5 of their first-round series against the Rockets, Dray was asked about the competitive impact of injuries to Curry and, in Los Angeles, to Chris Paul and Blake Griffin. He took the opportunity to remind everyone the most serious aspect of those injuries at the 5:25 mark of the audio provided by the Warriors below.
It sucks because you hate to see anyone get hurt. I think sometimes fans will get it twisted like “that’s good for our team.” But you live that every day. It’s not like you walk off the court and Chris can go pick his daughter up. He can’t go pick his daughter up with that hand now. It’s not like Steph can walk off the court and go run around with his daughters. It don’t happen that way — you live that [injury] every day… It’s bigger than basketball, it’s life.
He couldn’t be more right. It’s easier and more convenient for fans to view players only as the avatars of their hopes and dreams for their team, but anyone who’s had a serious injury in their own life knows that it doesn’t just affect how well you perform at sports, or even your job. Steph and Chris and Blake may have gotten hurt in service of our entertainment, but their pain doesn’t turn off with the TV set.
