The Golden State Warriors-New Orleans Pelicans series is starting to heat up, as is the one-on-one rivalry between Draymond Green and Rajon Rondo.
Friday’s Game 3 saw Green and Rondo getting into it again and having to be separated. The two exchanged words after a whistle in the first quarter.
Draymond not letting Rondo practice after the whistle oh let’s go#PettyWarz pic.twitter.com/3OFDeQKUcC
— Rob Perez (@World_Wide_Wob) May 5, 2018
Then in the fourth quarter, Rondo was seen supposedly trying to trip Green as the two teams were retreating to their respective benches for a timeout.
LOL at Rondo walking behind Draymond Green and trying to trip him #Petty pic.twitter.com/LRvW13TqFV
— gifdsports (@gifdsports) May 5, 2018
After the game (which the Pelicans won 119-100 to make it a 2-1 series), Green scoffed at a reporter who implied he and Rondo were trying to bait each other.
“I get nothing out of trying to bait Rondo at anything,” said Green, per Anthony Slater of The Athletic. “That does nothing for me. Once again, when have I went up and tried to bait him? Y’all hate the storyline of someone trying to bait me, huh? I just gotta be involved like, ‘Oh, Draymond’s doing this.’
“At some point, somebody gotta tell the truth,” the reigning Defensive Player of the Year added. “It ain’t Draymond this time. I’ve baited a lot of guys, tried to bait a lot of guys. Succeeded quite a bit, sometimes failed. I ain’t trying to bait nobody…. Draymond ain’t trying to bait nobody.”
Rondo, for his part, later hit back at Green’s remarks, saying that he thought that the opposite was true and that he was not the one who was baiting Green.
Rajon Rondo on Draymond Green theorizing that Rondo was baiting him, not the other way around: "That's his game. I don't try to bait him. He talks a lot of ish." pic.twitter.com/dHflty9OPQ
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) May 5, 2018
Game 4 between the Pelicans and Warriors will take place on Sunday in New Orleans, and the friction between the two players will be worth keeping an eye on, especially since they already had another heated confrontation in Game 2.
