The Heart & Soul of the Golden State Warriors

He may not be their best player...but Michigan bred Draymond Green is the heart soul of the NBA leading Golden Warriors.

- Yaron Weitzman

Outside, the sun had just begun to rise, but inside the walls of Michigan State’s practice facility, the man who in July had signed an $85 million contract was already hard at work. Dribbling up and down the court with both hands, then in and out of cones. Sometimes a medicine ball would be used. Afterward he’d move on to floaters and then three-pointers. “Keep your elbow up!” his former Michigan State teammate and current trainer Travis Walton would yell. Or, if he felt the effort was lacking: “Now that you’re rich you ain’t grindin’ no more?”

The air in the gym was usually thick, warm and sticky. Most of the time he’d arrive just as the building doors were being unlocked and before the AC could begin churning. Within minutes, pools of sweat would drip down Draymond Green’s forehead and penetrate his Spartan green shirt.

The previous Championship season had been a grueling grind, one he wanted to both revel in and recover from. And that he did. There were the Championship parades and a celebratory trip to Vegas with high school teammate and current NFL linebacker Lamar Woodley. There was an NBA-organized visit to China and time spent with family and friends.

He considered how far he’d come. From the gang- and drug-riddled streets of Saginaw, MI’s north side to Michigan State. From pudgy 268-pound freshman to the NBA. From second-round pick to role player to Defensive POY runner-up.

“I didn’t come into this League with a top-10 tag,” Green says over the phone one evening in December. “Everything I got I had to earn on the defensive end. Getting stops was the only way I could stay on the floor.”