If you had to pick a list of the most unlikely events to happen in the Warriors' season, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green having beef with Detroit Pistons backup Rodney McGruder would be right up there.
Thompson and Green made waves for their postgame comments after Saturday's blowout win over the Pistons when McGruder appeared to confront Juan Toscano-Anderson and the Warriors' bench. Former NBA veteran and current ESPN analyst Kendrick Perkins thought Klay and Draymond were being disrespectful, and he stuck with that view in a new episode of the "Dubs Talk" podcast, which will be released in full later this week.
"There's certain boundaries that you just don't cross," Perkins said to NBC Sports Bay Area's Grant Liffmann. "What I'm trying to emphasize is that I don't really have a problem with the trash talkin'. ... Here's the thing that I have to put out there to the world as being a former NBA player, a 14-year vet. Knowing that the average NBA career is three and a half, four years -- if you make it past that it's a blessing. ...
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"When you look at a guy like Rodney McGruder who went undrafted in 2013, who has been scratching and clawing every single year to make it in the league, to stay in the league, and it's hard because there's new players, there's younger players who are coming into the league every single year. So with Klay's statement saying, 'Oh, he's just mad because he's probably gonna be out the league next year,' I don't like that. Honestly, I didn't like that statement at all. I talked to a lot of former players, a lot of current players, who also didn't like that statement and they wasn't rollin' with Klay on that.
"That ain't cool. You can trash talk, but there's certain things you just can't get below the belt with and that's it."
Perkins also believes Green should know as much as anyone what it's like to be in McGruder's shoes.
"Draymond knowing that he was a second-round pick, knowing that he had to prove himself to get to the point where he's at -- I'm not sayin' don't stick up for your teammate, but there's certain lines you just don't cross and I think sometimes we all cross them lines where we all have to go back and say, 'You know what, I shouldn't have said that,' " Perkins said.
Golden State Warriors
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McGruder, 29, is in his fifth season in the NBA and his first with the Pistons. He has appeared in just four games and is averaging 2.8 points while playing 5.0 minutes per game. The Kansas State product played six minutes against the Warriors and scored a season-high eight points.
The Warriors don't play Pistons again in the first half of the season. It's unknown when the two teams will face each other in the second half.
To see more of the segment with Perkins tune into SNC: Warriors Edition on Tuesday night at 6 p.m. PT on NBC Sports Bay Area.