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Draymond Green Versus Stephen A. Smith Goes Another Round

The Golden State Warrior turned podcaster battles ESPN’s most visible host over commentary on a former NBA exec.

For a hooper who transitioned into podcasting, Draymond Green has a lot of smoke for the media these days, and he’s aiming his most pointed criticism at the most famous host in sports, ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith.

The battle between the two has gone on for several days this week, and it’s all over Green’s perception of how the media have treated Nico Harrison, the former Dallas Mavericks general manager who last year made one of basketball’s most controversial trades in history. Harrison was widely criticized for sending Luka Dončić from the Mavs to the Lakers in a three-team deal that returned Anthony Davis, Maxi Kleber, and Markieff Morris to Dallas. Since Dončić is considerably younger than Davis, internationally popular and considered one of the NBA’s top superstars, Harrison wasn’t just criticized over the trade, he was eventually fired and hasn’t landed a new gig in the NBA since.

Green thinks the media’s takes on the deal are especially unfair, though, and took to his podcast earlier this week to argue that some in the media are now saying some of the same things about Dončić–namely that he’s injury prone and is rumored to lack work ethic–that were the reasons Harrison wanted him traded in the first place. It all amounts to a double standard, he said.


Smith took to a segment of ESPN’s “First Take” to disagree, arguing that the criticism of Harrison was never personal but rather about the fact that Harrison reportedly dealt away Dončić without trying to get the best possible return for the superstar. That, he said, is fair game for anyone covering the sport, and something Green should understand.

“[Green] should know from personal experience,” Smith said.

“Because before the trade deadline, when it was a possibility that he would be traded, what did the Golden State Warriors, led under Joe Lacob and Steve Kerr and these boys, actually do? They put feelers out there to see what level of marketability he would generate. That is not what Nico Harrison did. Nico Harrison got on the phone with one dude.”

Never one to let his opponent get the last word, Green went back at Smith on the latest episode of his podcast.


“The problem that I have is we’re calling for all this accountability but all these guys just get to say things and there’s zero accountability, but always want to hold others accountable,” he said.

Since both these guys have microphones and big audiences, don’t be surprised if there aren’t more clapbacks to come.

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