Warriors forward Draymond Green is no stranger to on-court brawls, especially excessive physical contact toward other players that has caused the NBA to hand down numerous suspensions.
The heat of competition is so emotionally driven that there is no doubt players sometimes lose themselves in that passion, and Green has done well so far in regulating his emotional intensity in the 20 games he’s played in 2025.
Green is tied with nine other players with three technical fouls so far this season, three behind NBA-leading Dillon Brooks. The Warriors forward was asked on Monday by a viewer of his self-hosted podcast, “The Draymond Green Show,” what specific fight or altercation he personally regrets.
“I’m not one that really lives with regrets, that’s kind of how I roll,” Green directly established. “One moment that I really look back on is actually the moment with Jusuf Nurkic, because I actually think that moment cost me an opportunity to win a third gold medal.”
Green referred to swinging and hitting the then-Phoenix Suns center at Chase Center back in 2023, which ultimately led to an indefinite suspension by the league that kept him out of a 41-player pool to compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics. He previously won gold for Team USA in 2016 and 2021.
The NBA’s decision to suspend Green was further fueled by another incident involving Rudy Gobert with the Minnesota Timberwolves less than a month earlier, where the four-time All-Star held Gobert in a crude headlock. The league also required Green to receive mandated behavioral therapy after his ejection with Nurkic.
“So, I look back at that one like ‘Man, that sucks,’ but like I said, I don’t live my life with any regrets, at all,” Green said. “S–t happens, it is what it is.”
Green seemed to get the last laugh in the situation, trolling the Suns getting swept by Minnesota in the first round of the 2023-24 NBA playoffs. Sitting out the 2024 Paris Olympics appeared to help Green deal with the intense backlash from the incident and help regain his reputation.
“Things still turned out to be pretty fine for me, I can’t complain,” Green said. “But I gotta say, looking back at that moment, which is what it is, it would be that one.”
Having a “no regrets” mindset has benefitted Green for most of his career, and his four championship rings and 2016-17 Defensive Player of the Year award have solidified the chance of a statue outside of Chase Center once he retires. However, would the Golden State Warriors still have those four championship trophies if it weren’t for Draymond’s emotional intensity?
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