{"id":317333,"date":"2025-11-27T20:27:05","date_gmt":"2025-11-27T20:27:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/317333\/"},"modified":"2025-11-27T20:27:05","modified_gmt":"2025-11-27T20:27:05","slug":"draymond-green-sounds-off-after-latest-warriors-loss-our-defense-is-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/317333\/","title":{"rendered":"Draymond Green sounds off after latest Warriors loss: \u2018Our defense is s\u2014\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 Draymond Green was the last person to speak to the media in the Golden State Warriors locker room late Wednesday night after a 104-100 loss to the Houston Rockets that ended with Stephen Curry limping off the floor<\/a> and back to the locker room. The 35-year-old emotional leader of the proud group stood at the back of the locker room and offered a message that resonates better, whether Curry, who is scheduled to have an MRI to assess his right quad injury, can return to the lineup in short order or not.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur defense is s\u2014,\u201d Green said. \u201cBecause it\u2019s not necessarily the numbers. Like how do you feel when you\u2019re out there? And if it\u2019s just letdown after letdown, it\u2019s bigger than the numbers, you know what I\u2019m saying? Defense is about demeanor. So if there\u2019s letdown after letdown and it kills your demeanor, it kills your bravado, then you\u2019re just a soft team. So it\u2019s bigger than a number. What does the other team feel when you\u2019re defending them? And right now they don\u2019t feel no force.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green\u2019s words, and those of fellow veteran Jimmy Butler, were pointed after a loss that dropped the Warriors to 10-10. The group is average right now and knows it. They can\u2019t find consistency on either end of the floor and both Green and Butler have repeatedly pointed to the Warriors\u2019 defense as the larger problem, even though coach Steve Kerr continues to believe that the defense, ranked 1oth in the league<\/a>, is not as big a weakness as other issues the group is facing.<\/p>\n

The juxtaposition of Green and Butler\u2019s perspectives against Kerr\u2019s is interesting in that no matter which side you take, there are still enough issues to go around, and they could all be exacerbated depending on how long Curry is out. For Green and Butler, the fix in the short term is simple. It\u2019s been a common theme they\u2019ve echoed this season: Play harder \u2014 especially on the defensive end.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou got to box out,\u201d Butler said. \u201cYou got to guard, all of these things that we say we\u2019re gonna do that we do sometimes, but most of the time we don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

Butler is a fascinating character for the Warriors in many ways, but his presence becomes even more important if Curry has to miss any time. He has been the offensive leader many times in his career and he knows how to handle that kind of burden. But when asked if his mindset would shift without Curry, Butler brought the focus right back to where he believes his team\u2019s biggest problem still resides.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t care about offense,\u201d Butler said. \u201cWe got to guard somebody. We\u2019re good to score. But I don\u2019t want the offense, or if we\u2019re missing shots, to dictate not going and guarding on the defensive side of the ball. I\u2019m going to play the exact same way, but we just got to guard. We\u2019ll be all right.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s worth noting that yet again, despite a winnable game slipping away down the stretch, there wasn\u2019t panic in the Warriors\u2019 locker room. There was the feeling that Curry might have to miss some time, but the consensus was more frustration over a lack of execution rather than the season slipping away.<\/p>\n

Both Green and Butler went out of their way to say the Warriors\u2019 struggles weren\u2019t on Kerr or his staff. They feel that the group has prepared them to the best of its ability. It\u2019s the players who aren\u2019t playing up to their potential. So what will it take to turn things around and get the \u201cforce\u201d back, as Green called it?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt requires all of us as individuals to take on your challenge,\u201d Green said. \u201cIf you take on your challenge, then we can make the team thing work. But the only way the team thing works is if we take on an individual challenge. And right now we are individually, and I know everybody likes to twist words, I said we are individually f\u2014\u2014 awful.\u201d<\/p>\n

For his part, Kerr tried to keep calm regarding the events that led to the loss \u2014 and will likely affect the group\u2019s short-term future as Curry\u2019s quad is evaluated. The Warriors are who they are right now, but he still believes better days are ahead.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat did Bill Parcells say?\u201d Kerr said. \u201cYou are what your record says you are. So we\u2019re 10-10, we\u2019re an average team. And I think we have the potential for much more. And it\u2019s my job as coach to help these guys find that rhythm that can give us some juice, some separation, some confidence. So I believe in them and our guys, our continuity that we\u2019ve got from not only last year but Steph and Dray for 14, 15 years, whatever it\u2019s been. So I believe in the guys and we just got to keep working and we\u2019ll get there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green agreed with the assessment. He knows that the Warriors are playing with the type of inconsistency that has defined their season, that separates good teams from mediocre ones. He just didn\u2019t sound as optimistic as Kerr that things would be able to get back on track soon.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have bad losses and you\u2019re 10-10, guess what you are?\u201d Green said. \u201cA f\u2014\u2014 .500 team. Lose games that you should win. That\u2019s what .500 teams are \u2026 very average team right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green believes the defensive issues go hand in hand with the offensive swings, calling it a \u201cdomino effect.\u201d He said it starts with the Warriors\u2019 collective point of attack defensively. Once teams get a little confidence from the Warriors on the offensive end, their confidence grows a little bit in other areas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re getting f\u2014\u2014 blown by,\u201d Green said. \u201cAnd then our rotations suck, I\u2019m not helping great. So it\u2019s a domino effect. But when you get beat there\u2019s point of attack, then what happens? And right now we kind of suck at that, but the flip side, we got to take on the individual challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a challenge each player must take even more seriously as the prospect of playing without Curry looms. Green has been around the league and won for too long to change his ways now. He knows Curry leads one way, usually with more positivity, and he leads another. Butler said the Warriors would have to be \u201cdamn near perfect\u201d to win without Curry, given all the things he can do to help them on the floor.<\/p>\n

For Green, the challenge must come from within. That\u2019s why he shrugged off the idea that, without Curry, he might need to be the one to keep everybody\u2019s spirits up a little more for a team that is over a month into the season and still trying to find its way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a big keeping spirit up guy,\u201d Green said. \u201cThat ain\u2019t really the department I sell in. \u2026 That\u2019s somebody else\u2019s area to keep spirits up. I do mine the opposite way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 Draymond Green was the last person to speak to the media in the Golden State…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":317334,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[2243,355,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-317333","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-golden-state-warriors","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317333\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/317334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}