A better-focused Green is Junior’s achievement
PORTLAND, Ore. — Whom should we credit for Draymond Green’s newfound maturity and self-control?
Apparently, 2-year old Draymond Jr.
“He plays on his little hoop and then he stomps around the house,” Green said. “I’m like, ‘I like the intensity, but slow down, young fella.’
“I realize how impressionable the kids are and I just want to be a good example.”
Green has been arguably the Warriors’ most important player in these playoffs, at least in the stretch since Kevin Durant was injured. Green certainly was Saturday night, when he almost single-handedly dismantled the Trail Blazers,
giving the Warriors a 3-0 lead in the Western Conference finals.
After Green’s Game 3 tripledouble, head coach Steve Kerr praised his often-volatile player’s self-control, saying, “He’s not letting anything bother him: officiating, bad shots, turnovers.”
Green agreed, making the somewhat remarkable comment that he had been “disgusted” by his behavior, saying, “It got to the point where I was doing more crying than playing.”
Not many players would admit that publicly. Green, who is doing a solid job of undermining his haters, elaborated on that self-evaluation Sunday.
“There were times where I looked back at a game and I would see my body language, me pouting to a referee or something going wrong, and I would think, ‘It’s disgusting,’ ” Green said. “I remember earlier in the year I got into it with (referee) Zach Zarba and I was like, ‘Wow, that was embarrassing.’
“It’s something I really wanted to be mindful of, particularly coming into these playoffs.”
Green’s behavior and technical fouls are a perennial playoff issue, ever since his suspension for Game 5 of the 2016 Finals against Cleveland, which changed the momentum of that series. Green has four technical fouls through 15 playoff games this year, well clear of the seven-foul total that would result in a one-game suspension.
“You can’t make the same mistake twice,” he said. “I also realized how much energy I was wasting on something I can’t change. I can go and cry and complain about a call all I want, but it’s not changing. So why even focus my energy toward that?”
Green’s opponents would love for him to focus his energy on whining and crying instead of shutting them down and then barreling downhill to lead the fast break.
But as Green pointed out, he can bring passion and energy to his game without getting out of control.
“I just want to direct my energy toward more positive things,” Green said. “It’s funny because when the stuff happened with Kevin this year, everyone just laughed like, ‘Oh, that’s just Draymond. He’s emotional.’ Kevin said to me, ‘You’re not emotional, I’ve seen you locked in and not say a word to the referees. So I’m not giving you that pass.’ That stuck with me, too. I’m trying to be mindful of that.”
This is stating the obvious, but this type of honest introspection is rare. Not many players would label their behavior disgusting. Even fewer would willingly bring up an unflattering incident that has lingered over the season, but Green voluntarily mentioned what he learned from his November obscenity-tossing dustup with Durant.
This is one reason I’m pretty certain that, in a decade, Green — if he wants it — will inherit the Charles Barkley role on television. Green is smart. He’s funny. He doesn’t mind poking fun at himself. It’s going to be great TV.
But for now, he’s creating terrific programming on the court. When Durant was injured, there was a lot of debate about how the Warriors would fill that huge hole. Green has been doing much of the work.
“Obviously, I’m not capable of doing what Kevin does,” Green said, “but someone had to pick up the slack.”
The ball is in his hands more. He’s distributing and creating. He’s also encouraging and cheerleading. After Game 3, he gave a shout-out to James Laughlin, the Warriors’ video coordinator, who encouraged Green to stick with the bench players “to give them confidence.” Green remembered that advice when he was bucking up Jordan Bell on Saturday after a missed dunk.
“We always talk about strength in numbers, and that was coming from a video coordinator,” Green said.
Kerr didn’t notice a particular moment of change this postseason from his forward.
“But I’ve definitely been aware of the improvement in his focus, that’s been really obvious over the last couple of weeks,” Kerr said. “When he gets upset and emotional, it costs us. We lose our focus as a team. He’s our emotional leader, and if he can just move on to the next play, it’s a huge boost to our team.”
Now 29, Green has matured. He credits both his mother, Mary, and his fiancée for pointing out his behavior and encouraging him to stay locked in during the game.
And, of course, huge credit goes to the little guy who was born in December 2016.
“My son was shooting and he was flopping,” Green said. “I was like, ‘Son, you’ve got to stop watching the NBA. He’d fall on the floor and say, ‘Oh, dada, help me up.’ I said, “Naw, what are you flopping for?’… It’s pretty funny.”
Draymond Jr. showed his father what his stomping around looked like, and the mimicking is helping cure Dad.
Maybe Junior will pay a visit to James Harden next? Ann Killion is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: akillion@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @annkillion