Draymond Green Says He Gave Up Millions In His Contract For The Warriors To Sign Kevin Durant In 2016

The story of Draymond Green begging and pleading for Kevin Durant to join the Warriors after they blew a 3-1 series lead in the 2016 NBA Finals has now been properly sensationalized. Green wasn’t begging, he was conspiring with Durant behind closed doors while they were playing against each other in the conference finals.

Durant and Green discussed the texts they sent to each other on an episode of The ETCS Podcast Kevin Durant in 2021.

Durant: “I done heard a couple stories. From my end, we sent some texts on just, ‘Yo, I seen that? You seen that? Alright, bet. That’s really what it was, bro. It wasn’t no urgent FaceTime call. It was exactly what I just said. ‘Yo, you see what just happened?’ ‘Bet. Alright, I’m on the way.’

Green: “That’s exactly what it was. It was this whole narrative of, ‘You called Kevin crying from the parking lot.’ I’m like, ‘Yo, this s–t can … like y’all added a theatrical sense to make this s–t a movie. You got to make s–t for TV, but you got to add on a little bit. So people just started pouring on bro, but I wasn’t about to come out and fight it. However y’all think Kevin got here in your mind, just roll with that if that’s what helps you out.”

Green was definitely pushing to get Durant on his team. The team had just won their first championship in 40 years, and Green was instrumental in the franchise having reportedly just landed a $93 million max deal with the Warriors.

Reportedly.

During a recent appearance on the 7PM in Brooklyn podcast with Carmelo Anthony, Green said he only took $82 million in referring to that $93 million deal to give the Warriors an opportunity to sign Durant that summer.

However, a report from Yahoo back in 2015 also said that Green and the Warriors had broken off contract negotiations, which suggests that they weren’t exactly ready to pay him $93 million. So maybe Green is just saying that he took less money to look good when he wasn’t going to get that extra money anyway.

Regardless, this is what Green said.

“When I signed my deal [in 2015], B.J. Armstrong was my agent. The conversation me and B.J. had was, ‘Listen, here’s [the Warriors’] whole [salary] cap table. Here’s what it is next year. The cap next year jumps to this. Look who’s a free agent next year. KD. Here’s [the amount of money] you can take, and y’all will still be able to pay [KD] max. The number was five [years] for $85 [million].'”

Whether Green helped the Warriors out or not, the truth is that Durant’s signing played a major role in the Warriors dynasty. Between Durant, Green and the rest of that elite Warriors lineup, they won three championships in four seasons from 2015-18.

Article by Nathan Weick

USports writing intern and second year student-athlete at Juniata College in Huntingdon, PA pursuing BA in Professional Writing and BA in Spanish/Hispanic Cultures. Juniata College Mens Soccer Captain and former president of the Juniata College Class of 2026.