Stephen Curry calls Draymond Green criticism 'ridiculous,' blocks out the noise

The Cleveland Cavaliers are days away from hosting their championship ring ceremony, and we still haven’t stopped talking about the Golden State Warriors since the 2015-16 season ended. Part of that was the satisfaction many felt in seeing the greatest regular-season team in history blow a 3-1 lead in the Finals. But most of it is the dissatisfaction many felt in seeing that team add Kevin Durant in July.

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James may still sit atop the throne, but when it comes to the 2016-17, the Warriors are king. Las Vegas agrees. So, the media is tasked this preview season with figuring out, “How to beat the Warriors,” or how the Warriors might beat themselves, as Ethan Sherwood Strauss surmised in his recent ESPN The Magazine article, “Golden State’s Draymond Green problem,” for which 29 other teams would kill.

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Generally not one to stir the proverbial pot, despite his nickname, “Chef” Stephen Curry, the NBA’s two-time reigning and returning unanimous MVP, took issue with the unflattering portrayal of Green.

In some respect, Curry was borrowing “The Wire” line, “You come at the king, you best not miss.”

But did it miss the mark? Strauss is a well-respected and well-sourced basketball reporter (as is Amick, just so you know). He cited teammates, coaches and front office personnel, both on the record and off, painting snapshots of what he described as Green’s yearlong descent into the player who slapped James in the groin during Game 4 of the Finals, scuffled with a college student outside an East Lansing, Mich., bar and shared a picture of his genitalia on social media in a matter of weeks.

Those things happened. The things leading up to those things, undoubtedly, happened. Nobody has disputed the details Strauss reported, except perhaps Marreese Speights, who was quoted as saying, “Draymond f—ed up practice and s—. Draymond’s a good guy, but I think at the end of the day, it hurt the whole chemistry of the year.” And Strauss has since insisted the conversation is on tape.

Even Curry didn’t dispute the reporting. It is the conclusions that were drawn from those details with which the Warriors are apparently taking umbrage. Perhaps, then, they should be more concerned with the anonymous team official who told Strauss, “The guys might be frustrated by his antics, but they had an opportunity to prove themselves without him in Game 5 and they played like a bunch of [cowards].” Or the unnamed NBA executive who said, “He’s what will ultimately prevent them from having long-term success.” From there, it’s not such a leap to reach the conclusions Strauss did.

And, it appears, that’s exactly what the Warriors are doing, as Thompson told reporters last week:

Thompson is right to point out the hypocritical nature of a team official anonymously calling players “cowards,” but there are many reasons reporters maintain a source’s anonymity, most notably to gain more information from that person in the future and to ensure other would-be sources their trust would not be broken. Strauss has no reason to out a source and every reason to report an anonymous detail as juicy as a team official calling out the collapsing Warriors for playing like “cowards.”

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There are also many reasons for Curry and the Warriors to come to Green’s defense after such an unseemly portrait, most notably to maintain the complicated chemistry these star-studded Warriors seek in hopes of not falling prey to the warning signs within that article, which many would like to see destroy them. Also, they surely would like to make it clear any further leaks will not be tolerated. So, it makes sense Curry would follow his aforementioned comments to Amick with this praise of Green:

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For the record, Strauss said all of this and more, especially when it came to Green, who he called “perhaps the best two-way player in the league.” As for Curry’s comment, “it’s all about basketball,” Golden State’s season begins for real on Tuesday. All the previewing will be over, and the Warriors will have their chances to prove that last season’s collapse was a lesson learned, that Green’s near-miss of Allen Crabbe’s nether regions this preseason was not a continuation of the swipe he took at James in Game 4, and that their doubters — named or unnamed — are wrong about any locker room strife.

They’ll just have to wait until after Cleveland’s ring ceremony.

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Ben Rohrbach is a contributor for Ball Don’t Lie and Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at rohrbach_ben@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach