{"id":136249,"date":"2025-04-25T16:14:19","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T20:14:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=136249"},"modified":"2025-04-25T16:20:34","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T20:20:34","slug":"draymond-green-wins-nba-hustle-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/25\/draymond-green-wins-nba-hustle-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Draymond Green Loses DPOY but Wins Hustle Award"},"content":{"rendered":"

The NBA regular season<\/span>\u00a0awards for individual success keep rolling out<\/span><\/a>\u00a0during the first round of the playoffs.\u00a0<\/span>Payton Pritchard<\/span><\/a>\u00a0captured the Sixth Man of the Year honors earlier this week; Jalen<\/span> Brunson<\/span><\/a>\u00a0was named Clutch Player of the Year alongside\u00a0<\/span>Evan Mobley<\/span><\/a>, who was crowned the Defensive Player of Year<\/a>. On Friday, another award winner dropped, and it belongs to\u00a0<\/span>Draymond Green<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span>who<\/span> secured his first Hustle Award since it was introduced in the 2026-17 season. The award is <\/span>just<\/span> another accomplishment Green can add to his shrine of achievements throughout his Hall of Fame career. All <\/span>of<\/span> that being said, this was not the award Green was pining for, and it’s not the award he hopes he can still secure with the Golden State Warriors.<\/span><\/p>\n

Draymond Green Loses DPOY but Wins Hustle Award<\/h2>\n

Draymond Green’s energy stats win him the NBA’s 2024-25 Hustle award<\/h3>\n

Green arguably almost talked the league and voters into giving him his second DPOY. He ended up finishing third behind\u00a0<\/span>Dyson Daniels<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and the winner, Mobley. Say what you want about Green; there’s no question he deserved to be near the top of the conversation. His play on the defensive end of the floor spoke for itself all year. Some would even say he should have won. However, more voters saw fit to award the prize to Mobley, leaving Green on the outside looking in. While the Hustle Award still acknowledges Green’s significant impact on the floor for the Warriors, it’s not the recognition he wanted. It’s also nothing close to the accomplishment he guaranteed the NBA world he and the Warriors would achieve: a title.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Still, the Hustle Award embodies everything that makes Green the player he is today and has been his entire career. It acknowledges the impact that doesn’t necessarily show up on the stat sheet. Specifically, the award goes to the player who ends the regular season with the top composite ranking in nine “hustle stats.” Those stats include the following: charges drawn, deflections, screen assists, contested 2-point shots, contested 3-point shots, offensive loose balls recovered, defensive loose balls recovered, offensive box outs, and defensive box outs.<\/p>\n

According to Brian Martin of NBA.com<\/span><\/a>, Green didn’t\u00a0<\/span>actually<\/span>\u00a0lead the league in any of those areas. He was in the top 15 in five and top 40 in all nine categories. According to Martin, that has never happened in league history. As Martin states, the award goes to the players “<\/span>who make the effort plays that don’t often appear in the traditional box score but impact winning on a nightly basis<\/span><\/em>.” If that doesn’t tell the story of Green’s season\u2014and career\u2014then what does?<\/span><\/p>\n

Hustle award might be the only one Green celebrates this season<\/h3>\n

Golden State is up against it in their first-round series with the Houston Rockets<\/a>. The matchup has been physical to the core. Green has stood right in the middle of it, as he is accustomed to, given his style of play and role on the Warriors. Green guaranteed the Warriors would win it all this year during the All-Star break. <\/span>Jimmy Butler<\/span><\/a>\u00a0had entered the fold, and Green saw championship finals potential in the trade acquisition.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the Warriors have quite the predicament on their hands, with Butler taking a scary fall in Game 2. He fell from pretty high up, hitting the floor hard, and left the game in the first half. He did not return, and the Warriors lost, evening the series up 1-1. Butler is not expected to be available for Game 3<\/a> as the series shifts to The Bay, and his status beyond is uncertain. As long as Butler is out, Golden State’s chances of beating the Rockets in this series are doubtful. Then again, considering some of the opponents the Warriors could face in later rounds, there’s no great improvement to their overall chances.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, there’s no doubt Green remains confident in what he said, as he is with the Warriors when Butler does return. How long his guarantee lives is another question. When it’s all said and done, the Hustle award\u2014the one he didn’t talk about\u2014could be the only one he walks away with this season.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a9 Cary Edmondson-Imagn Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The NBA regular season\u00a0awards for individual success keep rolling out\u00a0during the first round of the playoffs.\u00a0Payton Pritchard\u00a0captured the Sixth Man of the Year honors earlier this week; Jalen Brunson\u00a0was named Clutch Player of the Year alongside\u00a0Evan Mobley, who was crowned the Defensive Player of Year. On Friday, another award winner dropped, and it belongs to\u00a0Draymond […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5081,"featured_media":136250,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1608,25,62],"tags":[409,4605,3966,1417,142,2614],"class_list":["post-136249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-basketball","category-warriors","category-nba","tag-draymond-green","tag-dyson-daniels","tag-evan-mobley","tag-jalen-brunson","tag-jimmy-butler","tag-payton-pritchard"],"modified_by":"Aaron J Zacharias","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5081"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136249"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136257,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136249\/revisions\/136257"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}