Draymond Green has made major strides since coming in to the league in 2012, when he was drafted 35th overall by the Golden State Warriors.
In his rookie season, Green averaged just 2.9 points per game, and played a little over 13 minutes per contest. He struggled shooting the ball, converting on only 32.7% of his shots. His shooting from behind arc was equally as bad where he only knocked down 20.9% of attempts from downtown.
His numbers have steadily increased each year he has been in the league. As a second year player, he improved his ability to shoot the long ball, more than tripling his made three pointers from the year before. He also was more effective with those shots nailing a more respectable 33.3% from deep.
Green was also a vital part in the Warriors taking the favored Los Angeles Clippers to a game 7 in the first round of the 2013 playoffs, where he was inserted in to the starting lineup for the injured Andrew Bogut.
Fast forward another year, and Green has become arguably the Warriors most important player behind superstar Stephen Curry. Green is having by far the best season of his young career posting career bests in just about every category.
Through 19 games, all of which have come as starts, Green is averaging 13.5 points, 3.4 assists, and 8.4 rebounds per game, all career highs. The biggest jump however, can be seen in his success when shooting the three. Green is shooting nearly 38% from deep and is averaging 3 more attempts from there as well.
In Saturday night’s impressive 112-102 win over the Chicago Bulls, Green hit a career best 7 threes and had 31 points, which was also a career high.
After the game, Green spoke about the his performance and how his teammates contributed to his great plays.
“My teammates really found me and put me in a good position,” Green said after his career night, “I think I got an assist from Steph, Klay [Thompson], Bogut, Shaun [Livingston], Andre [Iguodala]. I hit seven threes, that’s at least five of them right there.
“Most of the credit [has] got to go to them.”
The next day at practice, coach Steve Kerr spoke about how Draymond’s performance should be no surprise after the work he’s put in.
“I watched him last year, the guy makes five threes in Game 7 on the road, so he obviously has guts,” Kerr said during the media session after practice, “I think for Draymond it’s a pretty natural progression. You could see the improvement from his rookie year, last year, and now here he is given the opportunity with all the playing time and the open shots. It’s coming together.”
With David Lee still out with a lingering hamstring injury, no foreseeable change will be made to the starting lineup. It will get interesting to see what happens once Lee is healthy and ready to go. Will Green’s stellar play this season keep him in the starting lineup, or will Lee get his starting spot back which he has done nothing to deserve losing?
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