The Grizzlies and the Warriors are having a war of words
Not content with being crowned champions, it would seem some of the Warriors still have somethings to get off their chests.
The NBA Finals are over and the Warriors are indeed the Champions once again but that hasn’t stopped the war of words between Golden State’s players and a team they eliminated in early on in the playoffs.
Grizzlies’ Jaren Jackson Jr. provoked the Warriors
“Strength in numbers.” Those were the words tweeted earlier this year by Memphis Grizzlies big man Jaren Jackson Jr. after a regular season win over the Golden State Warriors on March 28. Little could Jackson have known, he was opening the proverbial can of worms. Needless to say a lot has happened since then and with the Warriors who sent the Grizzlies packing in the playoffs now crowned NBA champions, one could say things have come full circle.
While it may have been almost three months ago, Warriors star Klay Thompson showed that he most definitely keeps these things in mind when he spoke to journalists following the his teams’ Game 6 win over the Boston Celtics on Thursday night, which of course clinched the title of NBA Champions. Indeed, Thompson laid into Jackson without any mention of the Grizzlies player. “‘Strength in numbers’ is alive and well. There was this one player who tweeted ‘strength in numbers’ after they beat us in the regular season and it pissed me off so much. I can’t wait to retweet that thing. Freaking bum. I had to watch that like, I’m just like ‘this freaking clown.’ You’re going to mock us? You ain’t ever been there before, bro. We’ve been there. We know what it takes. So to be here again? Hold that. ...Twitter fingers, can you believe it? I got a memory like an elephant, I don’t forget, and there was a lot of people kicking us while we were down.”
The context behind the Grizzlies win over the Warriors
Though Thompson’s rant may seem out of place, it would only be fair to give the full picture of what occurred back on March 28th when the Grizzlies mauled the Warriors in what turned out to not only be a 123-98 blowout win, but a victory which saw Memphis take the No. 2 seed in the West. What’s the context? Quite simply the Warriors were without stars Stephen Curry and Draymond Green as well as Thompson himself. This of course doesn’t really help Jackson’s cause, but it certainly helps Klay’s.
Ja Morant, Draymond Green and the Christmas Day challenge
In case you didn’t catch it, the day after the Warriors were crowned champions, Grizzlies star Ja Morant backed his teammate by laughing at how the Warriors, who had just won their fourth championship could take time out to ridicule the Grizzlies who they eliminated in the Western Conference semifinals. Was that the end of it? Not even close. Draymond Green - surprise - stepped into the fray almost 2 days after Morant’s tweet. The Grizzliez star wasted no time in responding, as he issued an interesting statement just an hour later.
Morant tweeted what can only be seen as a direct challenge when he curiously requested that the NBA allow the Grizzlies to host a rematch against the Warriors for their Christmas game. To date no defending NBA champion has had to play on the road on Christmas since the 2013-14 Miami Heat. This of course begs the question as to whether or not it’s all hot air or should we be getting the pop corn out when the holiday season rolls around. Rest assured we haven’t heard the last of this spat between the Grizzlies and the new NBA Champions.