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SAN FRANCISCO — As the buzzer sounded and capped the Golden State Warriors‘ final game before the NBA trade deadline, Draymond Green was on the court sharing laughs and conversations with teammate Stephen Curry and Philadelphia 76ers guard Kyle Lowry.
Was the 113-94 loss on Tuesday, Feb. 3 at Chase Center Green’s final game as a Warrior?
The Warriors have had multiple players’ names swirling around the rumor mill ahead of the 3 p.m. ET (noon PT) trade deadline on Thursday, Feb. 5, and Green was one of them.
The Warriors’ next game against the Phoenix Suns on Feb. 5 at 10 p.m. ET (7 p.m. PT) is after the deadline.
Green has been mentioned in a potential trade that would send him and other Warriors players to the Milwaukee Bucks for Giannis Antetokounmpo, according to ESPN. NBA insider Marc Stein reported on Jan. 23 that Green would be included in a trade, rather than Jimmy Butler, who tore his ACL in a season-ending injury on Jan. 9.
Stein said the potential trade would include Green, Jonathan Kuminga and Brandin Podziemski, who grew up in Greenfield of Milwaukee County in Wisconsin.
Green said after the loss to the Sixers that he doesn’t know if he’s played his last game for the Warriors.
“Maybe,” Green told USA TODAY Sports. “I don’t know. I don’t foresee it that way. But if I have, like I said it’s been an amazing run. But I don’t know, we’ll see. I don’t sit and think about the possibilities of what may happen. It’s gon’ be what it’s gon’ be, regardless. That just, it is what it is.”
Green finished the game with six points, seven rebounds and three assists in 25 minutes. He wore his jersey during his postgame conference with reporters as he does with most postgame scrums, nothing unusual. But he acknowledged that there’s a “possibility” he could be traded.
“It’s a possibility that I might get traded. It’s kind of just what it’s like −yeah but at some point it’s going to come to an end,” Green told reporters about being involved in trade rumors and his Warriors’ tenure. “Whether it’s a day or two or a year or two, it’s going to come to an end at some point. You got to be okay with that. It’s not something that I can hold onto forever because I can’t play basketball forever. It’s got to come to an end at some point anyway.”
‘Business as usual’
Green is 35 years old. He was drafted by Golden State out of Michigan State with the 35th pick in the 2012 NBA Draft. He’s become a Defensive Player of the Year, four-time All-Star and a four-time NBA champion in 14 seasons with the Warriors.
Green told ESPN’s Anthony Slater that Warriors head coach Steve Kerr talked to him before the game that his name has been mentioned in trade talks and asked how his wife was handling it. Green said “that’s when it got real” to him and he spoke to his son about it on the way to Tuesday’s game.
“I was like ‘yo what if I get traded?’ He was like ‘well why would they trade you,'” Green said summarizing the chat pregame with his son. “I was like ‘It’s just the business. I’ve never been traded but it can happen to anybody.’ He was like ‘Oh, I just don’t understand why they would do that.'”
He told reporters that he’s spoke to the front office, but added, “it’s probably not quite the conversation you think it was” and that he talks to them “pretty often.”
Green didn’t feel like he played his last game with the Warriors. But he reflected on his time in the Bay Area after 13 to 14 years.
He said “it’s business as usual.”
‘All good things must come to an end at some point’
Green has been getting the question for the last couple days now and said “it doesn’t wear” on him since he can’t control it. If anything, he said, he can’t wait for the deadline so people will stop asking him about it.
“A lot of people want to know how I feel about it, if I’m upset about it, I’m not at all,” Green said. “If that’s what’s best for this organization, that’s what’s best for this organization. I’m not like ‘aww man, they (expletive) me over’ or something like that, I don’t really feel that way.”
Green has averaged 8.4 points, 5.7 rebounds, 5.2 assists, 0.9 steals and 0.7 blocks in 42 games with the Warriors in the 2025-26 regular-season. For his 14-year NBA career, he averages 8.7 points, 6.9 rebounds, 5.6 assists, 1.3 steals and 1 block per game.
He won the 2017 NBA Defensive Player of the Award after being named runner-up in 2015 and 2016. Green has made NBA All-Defensive team nine times.
Kerr said that Green will have a statue outside of the Chase Center for what he’s meant to the franchise, on 95.7FM The Game’s Willard and Dibs radio show.
“If you would have told me 13 and a half years ago like ‘yo I’m going to hand you this sheet of paper and you can sign it to be in a place for 13 years and a half years, would you sign it?’ I would’ve signed it faster than you can blink,” Green told reporters. “So what do I have to sit and worry about? What do I have to be upset about? I’ve been here for 13 and 1/2 years. That’s longer probably than 98% of NBA players have been in one place and a guy from Saginaw has been in one place for 13 and a half years. I don’t know that it ends at 13 and a half, but if it does what a (expletive) run it’s been.”
He’s seemingly content with whatever his destiny may be. There’s no animosity from Green towards the Warriors, he said that he’s “blessed,” “lucky” and “grateful.”
“My family hasn’t had to move anywhere since I started my family,” Green said. “That’s incredible. I don’t take that for granted. There’s guys that’s been on the move every year, moving their family two, three times in a year. So, I have so much gratitude for where I am in my career, the run I’ve been on here And I don’t know that it ends or what not. We’ll all see. But if it does, it does. All good things must come to an end at some point.”
If it comes to a point where Green needs to say goodbye, then he’ll say goodbye, he said.
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