Draymond Green: Thompson’s Warriors exit might bring back joy of basketball

Draymond Green desperately wants Klay Thompson to rediscover his joy of basketball, even if that means shedding a “tear or two” over losing him as a Warriors teammate and fellow cog of their four-championship dynasty.

“I want to see him have that love again, because I witnessed what happened when he did have that love,” Green said on his podcast Tuesday, a day after Thompson reportedly agreed to a sign-and-trade deal with the Dallas Mavericks.

“Last year wasn’t that. It was probably as far opposite as it can be from that,” Green said of Thompson’s mindset. “To selfishly see him stay here and suffer for whatever was griping at him, no, that wasn’t cool for my own benefit.”

Green said Thompson called him last week to say he was leaving the franchise he joined in 2011 – a year before Green arrived and two years after Steph Curry came aboard.

“The healthy competition between him and Steph on who is the best shooter was one of the highlights of my career,” Green said. “Just to watch that on the daily, to watch them go at it after practice and during practice, it was beautiful.”

Last season became downcast, however, as Thompson was pushed to the bench.

“I’m happy for Klay. I think last year was a very trying year for him,” Green added. “The highs and the lows of last year was very hard on Klay. As a brother to see somebody go through that, it was hard to watch.

“If you ever care about someone, and one of the reasons when he called me, I didn’t even want to attempt talking him out of leaving.”

Thompson’s misery was traced to his declining role on the Warriors, to his declining on-court skills, and to the team declining to offer him a respectable contract extension the past two summers, ESPN reported.

“Klay, I don’t think there is something he loves more than playing basketball, and I didn’t see that last year,” Green said. “… Could it have been the contract playing a part of (Thompson’s sadness), because he was kind of in the same position (as Green in 2023)? I personally don’t think it was that. There were a lot of other things going into it.

“I do know the joy that basketball brings him. It brought sadness, it brought unhappiness last year for him.”

Green said he ran into Thompson on Sunday while in Denver for a concert and that it was awkward knowing they’d no longer be teammates. Yet Green was deeply appreciative of their time together – and Thompson’s chances at finding great joy in basketball elsewhere.

Green revealed he almost left a year ago for Memphis before the Warriors awarded him a four-year, $100 million deal.

Green also wanted to see Paul George come aboard this week in free agency and voiced his displeasure with the Los Angeles Clippers’ unwillingness to accommodate a sign-and-trade deal; George reportedly landed a four-year deal with the Philadelphia 76ers.

“I’m also salty about that, because as you know, Paul George was gonna come to the Warriors,” Green said. “And we wanted Paul George to come to the Warriors. … The Clippers didn’t really want to play ball. They didn’t want to help him get to where he wanted to go. So, in turn, they get nothing back.”