Report: NBA investigating Timberwolves-Warriors fight

Draymond Green was last suspended during last season's NBA playoffs.
Report: NBA investigating Timberwolves-Warriors fight
Report: NBA investigating Timberwolves-Warriors fight /

Suspensions and fines could be coming for players involved in Tuesday's scuffle between the Minnesota Timberwolves and Golden State Warriors. 

According NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski, the NBA is "looking further" into the incident that saw Jaden McDaniels and Klay Thompson tugging on each other's jerseys before Draymond Green put Rudy Gobert in a headlock. 

Wojnarowski says a decision should come before the Warriors face the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday night, which suggests that McDaniels should be able to play Wednesday night when the Timberwolves face the Suns. 

The chaos erupted just 1 minute, 43 seconds into the opening quarter, with the game scoreless when Thompson and McDaniels began to tussle. While McDaniels and Thompson were ejected after being assessed technical fouls, Green was thrown out of the game for a more serious Flagrant 2 foul. 

If Green is suspended, it won't be the first time in his 12-year career. Most recently, he was suspended one game for stepping on the chest of Sacramento's Damontis Sabonis during Game 2 of last season's playoff series in April. 

Green was assessed a Flagrant 2 foul and ejected from that game, and the NBA's decision to suspend him for Game 3 "was based in part on Green’s history of unsportsmanlike acts."

Tuesday's fracas was similar to the October 2019 incident between Minnesota's Karl-Anthony Towns and Philadelphia's Joel Embiid. The NBA suspended both players two games for which the NBA said "Embiid and Towns engaged in a physical confrontation that involved wrestling one another to the floor."

Gobert was not penalized during the melee Tuesday night and after the game he described Green's actions as "clown behavior" while McDaniels said he was defending himself after Thompson grabbed his jersey. 

Gobert took it one step further, saying he thinks Gobert was trying to put him to sleep with a choke hold. 

Gobert slams ‘clown behavior’ of Draymond Green; McDaniels reaction

"He’s grabbing me, he’s grabbing me, he’s grabbing me. (But) the choke wasn’t good enough. Yeah, it wasn’t enough for me to really have to (go to sleep). But he tried. He tried really hard, but it wasn’t good enough to where I felt like I was really in danger of falling asleep or something like that. It was a long time, and if he knew how to choke it could have been way worse. He tried to. His intention was to really take me out. And I kept my hands up the whole time just to show the officials that I wasn’t trying to escalate the situation." Gobert said, according to The Athletic

The Timberwolves and Suns tip off Wednesday at 9:30 p.m. in Phoenix. 


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Joe Nelson
JOE NELSON

Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen.  His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011.  Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play.  Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers.  Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.