July 1, 2024 marks a sad day in the Golden State Warriors franchise, with Klay Thompson choosing to depart for the Dallas Mavericks after 13 fruitful years with the Dubs. For a while, it has looked as though a breakup between the two parties was inevitable. Draymond Green, on the latest episode of his eponymous podcast, shed more light on how difficult the 2023-24 season was for the 34-year old sharpshooter, which eventually led to his decision to seek out greener pastures.
“I do know the joy that basketball brings him and like it brought sadness, it brought unhappiness last year for him,” Green said. “Number one goal is to see them happy and enjoying what they do because you care about their well-being. [To that end], a part of me wanted Klay to leave. Not wanting him to leave in the sense of wanting him to leave, but wanting him to leave because you only want to see him be the guy you know he is.”
"I do know the joy that basketball brings him and like it brought sadness, it brought unhappiness last year for him."
Draymond Green on where Klay Thompson was at mentally last season with the Warriors 🗣️
(via @TheVolumeSports)pic.twitter.com/XuXvJMumTG
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) July 3, 2024
Draymond Green has spent his entire career sharing the Warriors locker room with Klay Thompson, and those 13 years have brought a ton of highs and lows — mostly highs — for the most successful franchise of the past decade. Green knows Thompson inside and out, and it’s refreshing to see the former only want the best for the latter, even if it means parting ways.
The 2023-24 season was turbulent in more ways than one for a Warriors team that, not too long ago, won a championship. While it led to Thompson’s eventual exit from the team, which heartbreakingly breaks up the Dubs’ famous big three of him, Green, and Stephen Curry, at least this allows both parties to seek out what’s best for them in the long run.
Some break-ups are mutually beneficial, and this is one of them
Break-ups tend to be a messy, overly emotional ordeal, and Klay Thompson’s departure from the Warriors is no different. Stephen Curry expressed his sadness over Thompson’s exit via Instagram, as the Splash Brothers, for the first time in their careers, will be suiting up against one another on an NBA court.
Thompson knew that staying with the Warriors could have led to even greater resentment, especially when the two sides have failed to see eye to eye for the greater part of the past year. With the Warriors reportedly low-balling Thompson and asking him to accept a reduced role, the 34-year old shooting guard’s decision to leave, at the very least, helps rip the band-aid off of the two sides’ fractured relationship and facilitate healing.
When all is said and done, Klay Thompson’s number 11 jersey will be hanging on the Chase Center rafters. There will be a statue of him, Stephen Curry, and Draymond Green outside of their arena. But for now, the two will be proceeding with their lives apart from one another, marking the end of an era.
A retrospective of Klay Thompson’s tough 2023-24 season for the Warriors
Klay Thompson was showing signs of steep decline during the 2022-23 season; despite still being one of the best volume shooters in the association, averaging 21.9 points on 44/41/88 splits, Thompson was more prone to the occasional rough shooting night. After missing two seasons, it’s understandable for him to lose a step or two on defense, but as one of the premier 3-and-D guards of the past decade, a drop-off in his perimeter defense is detrimental to his overall value.
During the Warriors’ playoff exit at the hands of the Los Angeles Lakers in 2023, Thompson struggled immensely, and these struggles carried over to the 2023-24 campaign. Thompson’s shot selection remained the same, but his shot-making prowess did not. He was as inconsistent and unreliable as ever, which led to an eventual demotion to the bench back in February.
While Thompson rebounded to end the 2023-24 season, averaging 21.8 points on 49/42/100 shooting splits in the final 10 games of the season, he threw all that goodwill he had earned back away with perhaps the worst game of his career during the 9/10 play-in tournament matchup against the Sacramento Kings.
Thompson missed all 10 of his field-goal attempts, and his body language was all out of sorts. He didn’t even earn a trip to the line, and as a result, he finished scoreless in a game where he wasn’t ejected for just the fourth time in his career — with three of those instances coming during his rookie season when he was still backing up Monta Ellis.
There was just an air of disappointment from all sides amid Thompson’s topsy-turvy 2023-24 season; will he finally get his joy back when he suits up alongside Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving next season?
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