Draymond Green to Sagging Defenders: ‘Gonna Start Lighting Their a** Up’

Programming note: Watch the pregame edition of Warriors Outsiders tonight at 6 p.m. PT streaming live on the MyTeams app.

Draymond Green is a basketball fanatic. When he's not playing the game, he's talking about it and/or watching it on TV.

Speaking of TV -- he sees and hears everything that is being said about himself and the Warriors, and there's been plenty of noise out there since Golden State's embarrassing loss to the Lakers on Christmas Night.

And after shootaround on Thursday, Draymond sounded off to reporters.

"My defender (is) going to have to pay. I'm not about to trip over something that happened in Game 32, 33 (it was Game 35). These games gonna start to become a lot more important down the stretch and playoffs. That's kind of when I play my best basketball anyway.

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"My defender gonna have to pay ... I'm gonna start lighting their a** up. And that don't just mean scoring by the way. I ain't really been doing me. I ain't been playmaking like I can, I ain't been scoring when I got the opportunity, I ain't been rebounding like I can ... I just haven't been myself.

"Everybody is kind of looking at the scoring. I don't really look at that. Yeah I gotta be more aggressive on the offensive end, but I just gotta be me all the way around ... I think one of my best games of my career was when the blowup happened at OKC and I had one point and 17 rebounds and 16 assists or something like that ... I don't need to score to completely annihilate a defense.

"Shots are gonna fall when they fall, but I have completely destroyed defenses not shooting the ball. So I just gotta be that person. And when I'm that person, my shots will fall. That's how I look at it."

Draymond Green, very confident he'll bust out of his offensive slump: "Don't worry about my defender. My defender going to pay." Here's the full, entertaining quote. pic.twitter.com/EPUOrVCQl0— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) December 27, 2018

Draymond is referring to the Feb. 27, 2016 game vs the Thunder when he and Steve Kerr got into a heated confrontation in the locker room at halftime. His final statline that night -- 2 points (0-for-8 FG), 14 rebounds, 14 assists, 6 steals, 4 blocks.

Why hasn't Draymond been himself lately?

"I can sit here and make a ton of reasons, but at the end of the day not one of them really matters," he told reporters. "It's about playing better. We're blessed to play this game for a living. It's my job to play better. It's my obligation to this team to play better. It's my obligation to myself to play better."

Is he feeling OK physically?

"I feel amazing. Mentally, too. That's most important. I feel incredible."

Over the Warriors' first 10 games this season, Draymond was "himself." He averaged 8.4 points, 7.5 rebounds, 8.5 assists, 2.0 steals and 0.9 blocks on 48.5 percent shooting. The one blemish was his 26 percent clip from 3-point range.

Since returning from his toe injury, the 2017 Defensive Player of the Year is averaging 7.4 points, 8.4 rebounds, 5.8 assists,1.9 steals and 0.9 blocks, while shooting 35.9 percent overall and 22.7 percent from deep.

Try to pretend like you aren't excited to see Draymond in action tonight...