Draymond Green Used to Fight “Grown Men” Who Bullied Him on the Court

Draymond Green is, without a doubt, one of the toughest players in the entire NBA. Some fans—especially fans who dislike the Warriors—might dispute that. But if they were in charge of putting together an NBA team, we bet most of those same fans would want Green on their team. The guy doesn’t back down from anyone, and he routinely welcomes the challenge of guarding guys who are significantly bigger than him.

He’s apparently been battling bigger, older, stronger players for a long time, too. Green appeared on the cover of the latest issue of Sports Illustrated, and inside the magazine, he talked to Lee Jenkins about his upbringing in Saginaw, Michigan. According to him, he literally had to fight for a spot on the court at his local rec center and would often scrap with “grown men” who would bully him simply for trying to call “Next!” Jenkins painted a picture of how it used to go down in Green’s cover story while describing his current mindset when playing against bigger, taller NBA players:

We don’t know about you, but the thought of an angry Draymond Green hurling pool balls is pretty terrifying.

Elsewhere in the story, Green’s Golden State coaches talk about his unusually high basketball IQ. Green looks back on all of the teams that passed him over in the 2012 NBA Draft and openly criticizes several of them for doing it. And while Green might come across as a big tough guy, he also shows off his softer side by openly admitting that he cried while watching a Steph Curry documentary on ESPN this season:

You can read Green’s entire SI cover story here.

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