{"id":579631,"date":"2026-02-03T14:07:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T14:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/579631\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T14:07:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T14:07:12","slug":"lakers-lebron-james-warriors-draymond-green-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/579631\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers LeBron James, Warriors Draymond Green friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"

LeBron James<\/a> and Draymond Green flashed wide grins as they danced at a Bad Bunny Concert in Puerto Rico in July. They walked the streets of Monaco as fans gathered around them taking photos in 2024. They sang side-by-side at a Brent Faiyaz show in Toronto in 2023.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s shocking, considering just a short while ago they were engaged in physical and psychological warfare when the Cavaliers<\/a> and Warriors met in four straight NBA Finals from 2015-2018.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There was palpable hostility. They trash-talked. They jostled. Things were so cantankerous that Green became irate when James stepped over him during Game 4 of the 2016 Finals, viewing it as a form of disrespect. Green responded by striking James in the groin, leading to him being suspended for Game 5.<\/p>\n

Draymond Green and LeBron James vie for a rebound during Game 1 of the 2015 NBA Finals in Oakland. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

How does James feel about Green now?<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the guy,\u201d James told the California Post in an exclusive interview. \u201cHe\u2019s awesome. He\u2019s a great dude.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just a short time ago, they were at the epicenter of the most storied rivalry in NBA history since the Los Angeles Lakers\/Boston Celtics. While James and Steph Curry were the faces of those battles, James and Green were the souls of them. They were the fire. They were the corporeal embodiment of the intensity that made it so thrilling.\u00a0(They\u2019ll meet again Saturday when the Lakers host the Warriors at 5:30 p.m. on ABC.)<\/p>\n

So, how did they go from hating each other to becoming travel buddies? It even surprises Green, who deemed it inconceivable.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere [was] just no path to friendship,\u201d Green told the California Post in an exclusive interview.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The game that changed everything<\/p>\n

Everything began to shift during the 2017 All-Star weekend in New Orleans.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Green didn\u2019t have any plans after the game, so he asked his close friend, Maverick Carter, where he was traveling. Carter was going to Anguilla with James. Green asked if he could join.\u00a0<\/p>\n

James was not pleased by this development.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMaverick got a separate plane,\u201d Green said. \u201cWe were going to the same place. We left within five minutes of each other. We stayed within 30 seconds of each other. And we took separate planes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green didn\u2019t think much of it at the time. But he laughs while recalling the story now. \u201cI\u2019ve flown with Bron now several times, there\u2019s always an extra seat or two or three or four [on his plane],\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Things were tense when they arrived.\u00a0<\/p>\n

James and Green were cordial. But it was awkward. They played cards a few times. They talked a bit. Slowly, they started realizing they had things in common.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cRespect,\u201d James said. \u201cThat\u2019s what it all boils down to. Respect and just admiration for one another. We both come from the Midwest. Both come from the struggle. He\u2019s from Saginaw. I\u2019m from Akron. It\u2019s not much difference when it comes to Michigan and Ohio.\u201d<\/p>\n

LeBron James is fouled by Draymond Green during the third quarter in Game 3 of the NBA Finals at Quicken Loans Arena. Bob Donnan-USA TODAY Sports<\/p>\n

James and Green were both raised by single mothers. They grew up below the poverty line. They witnessed things during their childhoods that still haunt them. They defied the odds.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While they didn\u2019t leave that trip as close friends, a seed of mutual understanding was sowed. They realized they\u2019re both \u201call-seeing,\u201d on and off the court. They realized they have similar world views.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But before they could move forward, they needed to clear the air.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took us also to have a man-to-man conversation,\u201d Green said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t like, okay, we\u2019re gonna be around each other and nothing has happened. Or that\u2019s just that. No, it required us to sit down and have a man-to-man conversation of like, what has happened, what\u2019s to be, who he is as a man, who I am as a man, what\u2019s tolerated, what\u2019s not tolerated. We talked through all those things. And then you quickly realize, damn, we\u2019re actually a lot alike in a lot of ways.\u201d<\/p>\n

They discussed words that were exchanged. They agreed upon rules. But there was one thing they didn\u2019t dare bring up: The incident in Game 4 in 2016.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe never one time talked about the exact moment,\u201d Green said. \u201cNever. Not one time still to this day. One day, I want to talk to him about that moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Their epic NBA Finals battles<\/p>\n

In many ways, those four straight Finals meetings helped define both of their careers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

James was at the peak of his powers. He was a freight train with the agility of a motorcycle. There were no holes in his game. After he led the Cavaliers from a 3-1 series deficit<\/a> during the 2016 Finals \u2014 a feat no other team in NBA history has accomplished \u2014 he called himself the greatest player of all-time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As for Green, while playing against James, he transformed himself from a low draft pick (35th) who was undersized as a power forward into a four-time champion, four-time All-Star, nine-time All-Defensive Team selectee and Defensive Player of the Year in 2017.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout question, that brought out the best in Draymond and solidified who he was as a player in this league and the status that he\u2019s held for so long in this league,\u201d said Ron Adams, the Warriors\u2019 longtime assistant coach who\u2019s known as their defensive guru.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Draymond Green and LeBron James talk on court before warm up at T-Mobile Arena. Candice Ward-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Their battles were epic.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They guarded each other at times. They schemed against one another. They have two of the highest basketball IQs in the history of the game. And they were constantly trying to gain an edge over each other.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a physical battle going on,\u201d Adams said. \u201cThere was an emotional, psychological battle going on between them. And there was a PR battle going on in terms of putting pressure on the other in terms of the press. There were a lot of different aspects that made up that rivalry. But it was fierce.\u201d<\/p>\n

A true test for King James<\/p>\n

For Green, James was always his measuring stick.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The first time he played against James during his rookie season in 2012, Green made a game-winning backdoor layup against Miami to lead Golden State to a 97-95 win. \u201cThat for me was a pivotal moment in my career early of like, oh, I can compete here,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n

Then, when they met in the Finals, Green was put to the ultimate test.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While James had already long-established himself as the face of the league, Green was a blue collar worker. He poured out his heart night after night, using a combination of savvy and grit to take away angles, anticipate, and disrupt, becoming what Adams called \u201cone of the greatest ever\u201d on the defensive end.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the guy,\u201d James said of Green. \u201cHe\u2019s awesome. He\u2019s a great dude.\u201d Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports<\/p>\n

Green could guard any position. And James was the ultimate positionless player, who was able to cut through seas of defenders as a point guard just as easily as he could use his 6-foot-9, 250-pound frame to pound bodies down low.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom Draymond\u2019s perspective, he had to not only utilize every physical ability that he had, but every bit of cunning he had as a defender against a bigger, stronger, more superior athlete,\u201d Adams said.<\/p>\n

Those games were just as much intellectual challenges as they were physical ones.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Adams praised Green for being able to anticipate better than anyone where James\u2019 spots were. The goal was to take away some of the weapons in his arsenal. Stopping James was an impossibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There was so much more happening on the court than the naked eye could perceive.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we\u2019re playing basketball, it\u2019s a chess match,\u201d Green said. \u201cEvery play down the floor, I\u2019m keying into what he\u2019s trying to do. Even if he doesn\u2019t have the ball, even if he\u2019s not in the play, he\u2019s trying to do something and vice versa. When he has the ball, I can see him scanning to know always where I am. And I\u2019m trying to plug here and he\u2019s trying to take advantage, knowing I\u2019m plugging there and trying to get something else open.\u201d<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve always deeply respected each other\u2019s games.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Green has long-called James the greatest player of all-time. And James has praised Green for a large part of the Warriors\u2019 success. \u201cI think who\u2019s mastered versatility over the last 10 years is Golden State,\u201d James said on \u201cMind the Game\u201d podcast. \u201cAnd the main reason is because of Draymond Green.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brotherly love still comes with a little drama<\/p>\n

While James and Steph Curry were the faces of the Warriors vs. Cavaliers battles, James and Green were the souls of them. AP<\/p>\n

Even after Anguilla, things continued to be heated.<\/p>\n

After the Warriors won the 2017 title, Green made fun of James for looking bald in a workout video. Then, while holding the microphone and addressing over a million people at his team\u2019s championship parade, Green mocked James for claiming he never played on a superteam. James fired back, quipping \u201cmy name is in your head\u201d on the \u201cRoad Trippin\u201d podcast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But James and Green kept spending time together. And their friendship kept deepening.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They\u2019re both quick to laugh. They enjoy fine wine. They pride themselves on being great fathers. They have two of the most powerful voices in the league.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And after trying to live in each other\u2019s minds during four years of heated competition, they understand each other better than most could.\u00a0<\/p>\n

James was there for Green during the lowest point in his career. Green contemplated retiring a few years ago after a string of incidents, including serving a five-game suspension for putting Rudy Gobert in a chokehold in Nov. 2023, followed by being suspended indefinitely for striking Jusuf Nurkic in the face in Dec. 2023, which cost him 12 games.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I\u2019ve had my trying times, he\u2019s one of the first people on the phone,\u201d Green said. \u201cImmediately, \u2018Yo, what\u2019s up? You all right? How are you doing? Need me for anything?\u2019 Always.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Green has supported James. When the Lakers superstar missed the first 14 games of this season because of sciatica, Green regularly checked in on him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI went through that injury,\u201d Green said. \u201cI dealt with that in 2022, the year that we won [our last championship]. \u2026It felt good to say, \u2018Yo, you might want to try this.\u2019 It felt good to be able to give him a couple of tips about the body and recovery. That\u2019s his wheelhouse.\u201d<\/p>\n

But even more importantly, Green has made sure to never take James\u2019 accomplishments for granted. While many fans \u2014 and players \u2014 have become inured to his constant record-breaking, Green always pays him his respect.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople get bored and accustomed to greatness that it\u2019s then no congratulations,\u201d Green said \u201c\u2026It sucks when people stop saying congratulations. We all want to be acknowledged for what we do. So, I try to be intentional about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for James, he went from not allowing Green on his plane to thinking of him as family.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI call him a brother,\u201d James said.<\/p>\n

In many ways, their four straight Finals meetings helped define both of their careers.\u00a0 Getty Images<\/p>\n

A lasting legacy<\/p>\n

Their friendship now transcends basketball. They have each other\u2019s backs. (So much so that Green apparently doesn\u2019t talk to Stephen A. Smith because he criticized James\u2019 son, Bronny.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Green has gone from taking verbal shots at James to using his podcast to defend him<\/a>. Their wives have become close. Green signed with James\u2019 agent, Rich Paul, in Feb. 2019. And James even attended Green\u2019s wedding in 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But there are still certain subjects they avoid.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In addition to the infamous 2016 incident being off-limits, they\u2019ve never talked about the details of their Finals meetings. There\u2019s no bragging. There\u2019s no poking. It\u2019s still too raw.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Behind closed doors, they can enjoy their accomplishments, as Green most definitely does.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt brings me great joy to know that I have the edge on him \u2014 I beat him in three NBA Finals, he beat me in one,\u201d Green said. \u201cIt brings me great joy to know that I can walk in the basketball room and there\u2019s something he can\u2019t say to me. There\u2019s not many things I can walk in the basketball room and I can say to him and he can\u2019t have a rebuttal. It\u2019s the one thing that I have that he don\u2019t have a rebuttal to. And that thing brings me a great deal of joy.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked if he ever brings that up to James, Green didn\u2019t hesitate.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d he said. \u201cNot at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green has gone from taking verbal shots at James to using his podcast to defend him. Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Green went on to explain that they\u2019re both so competitive that they know not to go there. The scars are too recent, too vulnerable. \u201cYou still feel those moments,\u201d Green said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Green has one regret when it comes to James: He never got to play with him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He believes the incident with Nurkic cost him a chance to compete for his third gold medal alongside James at the Paris Olympics in 2024.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve always wanted to [play with him]\u201d Green said. \u201cSaying I wanted to go to his team, that\u2019s not the case. I\u2019m very comfortable in my situation with 30 [Curry] and what we\u2019ve built and what we have. But I think him and Steph shared the want to take the court together, and they got the opportunity to do that in the Olympics in Paris. I\u2019ve always wanted the opportunity. Just to experience it, to see how he thinks, to see, all right, what I could do to help him and his thinking. Or what can I learn and pick up about what he\u2019s thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 41-year-old James<\/a>, who has hinted he\u2019s likely going to retire after this season or the next one<\/a>, will become an unrestricted free agent this summer. But Green made it clear that he doesn\u2019t see them sharing a uniform<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see a path to it,\u201d Green said three weeks ago before his name was involved in trade rumors for Giannis Antetokounmpo<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Regardless, James and Green will always be connected. Their journeys to greatness are inextricably intertwined. They\u2019re central figures of one of the biggest sports rivalries of the last decade.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They went from hating each other to developing an unshakable bond.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The two rivals turned friends embrace each other. NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n

And despite all that\u2019s unsaid between them, there\u2019s something much greater that\u2019s deeply understood.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe battles that we had are going to be the battles,\u201d James said. \u201cThey\u2019re going to talk about that forever, the 2016 Finals, 2017. But at the end of the day, what we got going into the future will define us as human beings, as brothers, as husbands, as sons as we continue to carry out our own individual legacies and help each other out through our lives and our journeys. I love the guy.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LeBron James and Draymond Green flashed wide grins as they danced at a Bad Bunny Concert in Puerto…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":579632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[7,160,193,200,1997,164,185,150,189,6,1220,11,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-579631","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-playoffs","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","11":"tag-draymond-green","12":"tag-exclusive","13":"tag-golden-state-warriors","14":"tag-lebron-james","15":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","16":"tag-miami-heat","17":"tag-nba","18":"tag-nba-finals","19":"tag-nba-playoffs","20":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}