In this reaction video, Draymond Green breaks down the Warriors' offensive system highlighted in the Mind the Game episode, focusing on the "split cuts" concept introduced by Steve Kerr. He explains how split cuts function as a layered, read‑and‑react progression, likening the process to a quarterback scanning multiple reads. Green emphasizes his role as the lowest passer, which gives him a comprehensive view of the offense and the defense’s reaction. He discusses how the split‑cut system evolved with the addition of Kevin Durant and weak‑side shooters, and how opponents like LeBron James have tried to disrupt it. Green then shifts to defensive strategy, identifying single‑side tag situations as among the toughest actions to guard, especially when defending shooters like Stephen Curry or Klay Thompson. He describes the challenges of tagging rollers without help and how positioning influences the difficulty of closeouts. Throughout, Green blends tactical analysis with personal anecdotes, using analogies to football and football safety to illustrate the chess‑like nature of NBA play.
Chapters
What's up everybody? Welcome to the Draymond Green Show YouTube channel. Make sure you hit that subscribe button. Make sure you like the post that you love. Thank you. Which is the Mind the Game. Like I said, those guys, JJ and Bron, they breaking down the game. They breaking down action. They having a high-level basketball conversation that quite frankly, most people probably won't understand, but they're doing a good job of breaking it down to you. And I saw them talking about our split cuts. When Steve introduced this concept of the split cuts, it took a while to build the chemistry on it because it's a feel thing. And so like it's all read and react. If I do this and they do that, then you do this. And if they do that, then you move. And it's like a quarterback reading. Like you got your first read, you got your second read, you got your third read, you got your fourth read. The interesting thing about it is like it layers and layers and layers. And as time has went on, we've just layered the split cut more and more. It started as just a pin in, guy come off, guy die. There's so many other layers to the split cuts now because it like, again, it's like a progression of a quarterback. Like you've read your, all right, next guy, next guy up. You see sometimes like a quarterback come to go across the field scanning their progressions, come all the way back, Like that's like the split cut, which is why I enjoy being the passer in the split cut because it's just fun. Like you're watching everything develop from the lowest point of the floor. Like you're lower than just about everybody. And now at times you got that guy on the weak side, which Brian was talking about KD, where you can skip to the weak side shooter, but you always want that guy to lift some to give you that angle to pass it. So in theory, you are the lowest guy on the floor. And if you think about that from a defensive perspective, the lowest guy on the floor is the most important guy on the floor. Why? Because he's the back line of the defense. He sees everything. And so in the split cut, I'm the lowest guy on the floor when I'm the passer. I can see everything develop. And sometimes you just see the breakdown happening. You like, okay, okay. I'm about to get him up. Boop, got him. There it goes. And you know, that's been a staple in our offense since Steve Kerr came 10 years ago. And like I said, when he first put the split cuts in, It was one of those things. And it goes back to the ball movement that he incorporated in our offense, which was like, yo Steve, you gotta like keep passing the ball. But like Steph and Klay supposed to get a lot of shots. And I remember very clearly him saying, the guys who's supposed to get the shots are good. The ball's gonna find them. And we all like, man, going with that Steve, man, that ain't going to work. What you talking about? Yeah. And sure enough, we started to pick that offense up over the first couple weeks and you like, man, the ball really finds Steph and Klay. Like it was very interesting. And the split cups were kind of the same thing. Like I said, it's just been layer of building. And to Bron's point, when KD came, I don't even think it was necessarily about putting a shooter on that weak side because number one, KD is far more than just a shooter. KD scores that basketball. Yeah. But that definitely makes a difference. But even if you don't have a shooter on that weak side, we also came up with another couple things that even if it wasn't a shooter on that weak side, you could still skip it to that guy and move on to the next action. And so that's, again, that's the layers of it. And there's plenty of layers to it. But yeah, nah, Bron caught a lot of hell with them split cuts over the years. You know, Bron liked to play quarterback. Yeah. And to his point, he's like, you gotta watch his eyes. Sometimes you gotta look Bron off a little bit and boom. And it's always fun with that, having that chess match with Bron because he is like Ed Reed over there, best free safety ever. I can't really, I feel like I'm an incredible free safety myself, but Bron is a great free safety and obviously he reads the game as well as anyone. And he's over there, he's always trying to get to the backside of that split and put himself in the help. But there's ways to, there's been ways to manipulate Bron too in the backside because you know he's trying to read it all. So it gets interesting, but the split cuts are a staple. They're tough to guard. And like I said, one of the reasons that it's the toughest thing to guard is because it's just a read and react thing. Like, so you can't quite script it. Like in the NBA defense, you script what you want to give up. You know, you like, we're taking this away, this, this, this, and this. But the reality is the NBA, so you can't take away everything. So you have to choose like, all right, if we're gonna lose to them, we're willing to die by this. And sometimes teams kill you with that, but more often than not, you're gonna win if you execute that plan. And with the split cuts, you can discuss what the patterns are, but at the end of the day, once it start happening, it's still on your players to read the situation and react to what's happening. And as they're reading, It's a lot of moving pieces coming around and they're trying to make those reads and it gets tough. And so yeah, it was cool to see Bron and JJ discuss the splits, knowing the hell that it's caused Bron over the years. Although I'm like Tyrese and now they beat us in the playoffs last year, so maybe I shouldn't talk. Nah, nah, that battle go too far back. That ain't stopping with one playoff loss.
But yeah.
So shout out to them. With that, you know, me looking at the NBA, I think when I think of the toughest actions to guard in the NBA, what would they be? Anytime you put somebody in a single side tag situation, that's always tough. That would be like if, say, if I'm Steph and I'm on the left side of the floor, you got Draymond rolling in to set a screen and he's diving, Steph's coming off to his right hand and you got Klay on the same side of the floor that the screen is now going away from, which means that puts Klay's man in a single side tag position. Single side meaning there's one guy over there. So you don't have another guy to X out in what we call. So if it's two guys on that side, if one guy go help, the one guy has to drop a bit and take the first pass out and play two. If you put a guy on a single side, there's no X. So you have to make that guy go tag the roller. So it would be me rolling or Trace rolling or JK rolling or somebody rolling. You have that, that guy is put in a situation where he has to go tag the roller, meaning go in and bump the roller. So ideally you want him to start in. 'Cause you start in, it's a one-way closeout, meaning I start there, I get my bump, I start to exit as I get my bump. That makes your closeout shorter. The reality is you put a guy like Klay Thompson on the weak side and you're not starting in because you scared as hell to leave his body. And so that's single side tag. To me, that's always one of the toughest actions to guard because you just put that guy in the blender and he gotta figure out how I can get this tag and get back to the shooter. And if it's Klay Thompson who only need that much space to get a shot off, it makes it tough on that single side tag. And then you just, you kind of play with Klay. You move him up and down. You know, higher up in the slot, you know, on the wing, to the corner. Like you move that guy based on where you want the tag to be or not to be, to make that tag tougher and a longer closeout. So to me, I think that's always gonna be one of the toughest actions to guard just because it's no help. And you put guys in a 2-on-1 situation in the NBA, the 2-on-1 should win out more often than not.
All right, the NBA season is in full swing, coming down the stretch. Then we move right into the playoffs in April, May, and June. I can't wait. Spice things up with DraftKings Sportsbook, an official sports betting partner of the NBA. Right now, all you have to do is put down $5 and get $150 instantly in bonus bets. Pretty good trade-off. I pay $5, I get $150. North Carolina listeners, do not forget, Welcome to the party. DraftKings Sportsbook now live in your state, North Carolina. Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app. Takes 90 seconds. The code is COLIN. C-O-L-I-N. Again, 90 seconds. Download DraftKings Sportsbook app. Put in COLIN. New customers bet $5, get $150 back in bonus bets instantly. That is the trade. All right. The code is always COLIN. The crown is yours.
