Choked out

Draymond Green is suspended five games. Rudy Gobert continues to send barbs.

Good morning. Let’s basketball.

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"Fright of a Girl"; Paul Klee; 1922

From the NBA:

Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green has been suspended five games without pay for escalating an on-court altercation and forcibly grabbing Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert around the neck in an unsportsmanlike and dangerous manner, it was announced today by Joe Dumars, NBA Executive Vice President, Head of Basketball Operations.

The length of the suspension is based in part on Green’s history of unsportsmanlike acts.

In my travels about the NBA Internet, I have found three reactions to this announcement:

• Warriors fans who find this suspension is unfair based on shorter suspension for other players fighting in recent years

• Folks who think Green has earned Morantian suspensions with his repeat infractions and consider this penalty too short

• People who don’t really care insomuch as this is all arbitrary and occasionally based on round numbers (valid) or the national TV schedule (not so valid here: Green will miss two ESPN games and return for a TNT game)

As the risk of being boring, I tend to err toward the third shrugging reaction. The math of suspensions in the NBA under the Adam Silver regime has never made much sense to me. The only one for which I feel a real and lasting anger is Miles Bridges, who as it were is now available to play for the Charlotte Hornets after serving 10 games of a 30-game suspension that Silver and his staff arbitrarily decided was partially served in the 2022-23 NBA season, when Bridges wasn’t even under f—-ing contract. HOW DO YOU SERVE A SUSPENSION ON A JOB YOU DON’T EVEN HAVE? (Like I said: a real and lasting anger.)

The circumstances of this particular Draymond infraction are pretty straightforward: amid a scuffle between the teams, Green clearly sought out an opposing player, escalated the violence and carried it on far longer than remotely necessary. Even if Green truly believed that Rudy Gobert was choking Klay Thompson, keeping him in a sleeper hold as long as he did, with Gobert nowhere near Thompson, with his coaches pleading with him to let go, is just completely absurd.

Silver’s regime will often excuse brief, hot bouts of on-court violence. Hence: Warriors fans finding examples of seemingly worse infractions getting less punishment. Silver’s regime does not usually excuse escalation. (Remember that Isaiah Stewart got two games with no history and no chokes, punches or slaps just for keeping up his attempt to fight LeBron.)

And Silver’s regime will absolutely hold a grudge. That’s how Ja Morant gets suspended 25 games for waving a gun on social media immediately after he told Silver he’d stop doing stuff like that. Disciplinary escalation is real.

Beef escalation in the media, mind you, is still happening. After Gobert’s post-game comments on how he “knew” Green would try to get ejected since he doesn’t like playing without Stephen Curry — a claim that

Tom Haberstroh

found has some basis in the data! — the Stifle Tower kept going in. From Sam Amick and Jon Krawczynski at The Athletic: