Kiki VanDeWeghe, the NBA’s Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations, announced Sunday that the NBA’s review of an altercation between Green and Cleveland Cavaliers’ star LeBron James resulted in a Flagrant Foul call on Green and a technical foul on James.
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Let’s go through the cast of characters, as the National Basketball Association uses the extra off-day to sift through the options with a ruling expected Sunday…
As he got up, Green whipped his fist into LeBron’s groin area as LeBron moved away, but not with much force. Because Green had already received three flagrant foul points for actions committed earlier in these playoffs, this pushed him to four points in the series and set off an automatic one-game suspension.
Green’s suspension comes after the Warriors took a 3-1 lead in the seven-game series against the Cavs. If the league were for some reason to find something that was worthy of a flagrant-2 sanction, Green would then be suspended for both Game 5 and Game 6.
“I just think we’ve got to come back anyway, so we might as well come back and play”, said Lue, about the possibility of forcing a Game Six.
None of the individuals tagged (James, Green, ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne and ESPN’s Marc Stein) responded.
With the All-Star swingman sitting out Monday’s Game 5 of the NBA Finals, it’s up to the NBA Coach of the Year and his staff to figure out a way to close out the Cleveland Cavaliers for a second straight title without all of the contributions from Green that Golden State has relied on all along. “I’ve got mad respect for LeBron and what he’s done”. Don’t disrespect me. There’s no love lost. It’s a battle out there.
“I’m not going to comment on what Klay said, because I know where it can go from this”, James said, via Sports Illustrated.
“You see every game what he brings, the energy, the defensive presence”, Warriors guard Stephen Curry said. “I guess his (James) feelings just got hurt”.
Hours later, Curry mocked him with a tweet.
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Commissioner Adam Silver put the hard-nosed, emotional leader of the defending champion on notice before the start of the rematch with Cleveland when he said that the Competition Committee would in the offseason be reviewing Green’s penchant for wildly flailing his legs on jump shots and rebounds.
