Amidst all the chaos and refereeing bias claims, the biggest story emerged yesterday from the host basketball team of the Paris Olympics. No, it wasn’t questionable officiating, but Les Bleus made an audacious decision to bench Rudy Gobert in the quarter-final. He only ended up playing for 4 minutes because of a ‘finger surgery,’ as per the DPOY himself. However, France’s head coach, Vincent Collet, claimed no procedure was done, and that it was a tactical decision, along with a minor injury. This confused Draymond Green.

According to the Warrior, the only team that can bench their stars is Team USA because of their abundance of elite league players. But when addressing France’s matchup-related call, Green was perplexed. “To be taken out of the lineup on any other team in the Olympics as an NBA player, not named Team USA, is kind of crazy,” he said. Dray then pointed out the contradictory reasoning provided officially, trying not to take a side, however, ended up giving Gobert a reality check.

“According to Rudy, it’s because of his finger. We don’t know what is true. I don’t think we have any reason to believe Rudy is lying except for the coach saying that it was for matchups,” he said on The Draymond Green Show. Instead of Gobert, France decided to inject the physicality and strength of Guerschon Yabusele, and it worked brilliantly. He bullied the Canadian defense on the inside, scoring 22 points. France took advantage of Canada’s lean center depth and played a scoring 5 rather than their defensive expert.

Speaking of the injury, Rudy Gobert isn’t lying about his ailment. He did have his fingers taped, indicating some sort of discomfort at the least. It was a big reason, if not ‘the reason’, for his limited time on the floor. Without the injury, the experienced campaigner would probably have played behind Victor Wembanyama, logging in significantly way more minutes than he did. Coming back to Green’s comments, the rival duo has a history of taunting each other, let’s dive deeper.

Draymond Green and Rudy Gobert’s escalated beef; from taunts to choking!

Since battling in 2017 for Defensive Player of The Year, Draymond Green and Rudy Gobert’s feud has become increasingly prominent with time. It began escalating in 2022 when the Warrior and the Frenchman traded insults about their defense, and Green publicly said he was ‘not like’ Gobert. Later in the season, after the infamous Jordan Poole incident, Gobert tweeted “Insecurity is always loud“. A season later, Gobert punched Kyle Anderson, and Green kept his receipts. He hit back with the same tweet. But until here, it was peaceful.

At the beginning of this season during the In-Season tournament, the Warrior put Rudy Gobert in a shocking prolonged chokehold without any provocation from the French center! The NBA suspended the outspoken forward for 5 games, which was only the start of a disturbing turn of events in his veteran career. But then again, Draymond Green isn’t one to stay silent. So when Luka Doncic hit a game-winner over Gobert during the postseason, the defensive stalwart had a response for the jeering Minnesota crowd.

“Rudy sucks, not me. What did I do?” he said when on Inside the NBA.

Clearly, their differences only keep growing, Hence it isn’t surprising to see Draymond Green be blunt with Rudy Gobert over his recent benching. However, in the coming game against Germany, who is equipped with tall centers, the three-time DPOY might be given his starting spot back provided he recovers from his injury.

Before you go, do not forget to check out this crossover between BG12 and Georgia Bulldogs star Asia Avinger. Do follow us for more exciting news.