In this segment of the Draymond Green Show, Draymond Green reacts to Joel Embiid exiting a game with an injury, using the incident to launch a broader criticism of the NBA’s newly instituted 65‑game minimum for eligibility for MVP, Defensive Player of the Year (DPOY) and All‑NBA honors. Green argues the rule creates perverse incentives, pressuring players to return from injury or play through pain simply to meet the threshold, which can jeopardize health and inflate financial stakes tied to awards. He points out the rule’s inconsistency with historical standards, noting past award winners (e.g., Kawhi Leonard’s 51‑game season) who qualified without meeting the new limit. Green also highlights the role of voters, suggesting they should simply ignore players who manipulate the system, and laments that league officials and owners—who invest heavily in player contracts—are effectively forcing athletes into risky situations. Throughout, he expresses concern for Embiid’s wellbeing, offers prayers, and reflects on his own experience losing a DPOY award, underscoring the personal impact of such policies. A brief DraftKings advertisement interrupts the discussion but does not affect the core argument.
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Joel Embiid left the game tonight with an injury. Number one, prayers up. Hope it's not bad. We know one of the stars and bright spots in this league, MVP, well on his way to a back-to-back MVP, which leads us to our next conversation, which is Joel playing tonight felt very much so because of the 65-game limit that we actually talked about once before on the pod. And in talking about that on the pod, I actually, I don't remember what I said verbatim, but I remember the gist of what I said, which was something along the lines of, everybody's happy with this 65-game rule until you got a bum on NBA, All-NBA team. Until you got somebody that's not totally deserving to be the MVP of the league. Because someone else didn't qualify before a game because of this game limit. Now, what I think is actually quite bullshit myself is to incorporate something at this point, a rule like 65 games need to be played in order to win an MVP or Defensive Player of the Year, All-NBA. Guys didn't face those rules before. But those same NBA, all NBA teams, those same MVP awards list, Defensive Player of the Year, those lists are the same. Like when the guys who make, who win those awards this year pop up on the list that they'll be added to, or once again, it won't say, and by the way, they reached a 65-game limit to make that. Like it's bullshit. Like that hasn't been a rule. So essentially to make guys, live up to a certain standard that wasn't the standard before to make these teams, but yet you only go on the same team. There's no added bonus, no added incentive for these things. So you end up on the same list as the guys who back in the day played and may not have played 65 games, but still made the list. I told y'all, I once lost a Defensive Player of the Year award to Kawhi Leonard, and I think he played 51 games. Wow.
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So whoever wins Defensive Player of the Year this year, it isn't gonna say, but he played 65 games. That's bullshit. And so in turn, you get Joel, who comes out there tonight because what, he's 3 games away from not qualifying to win MVP? And he forces it. And freak play with him and JK diving for the ball. But maybe it's not as bad if the knee isn't already banged up, right? And so now, because yeah, like Joel, I get it. Like yeah, you wanna win MVP. You worked that hard, put the work in that he's put in to get better. And continue to play at that level on a nightly basis? Of course you wanna win MVP. So yeah, you force it, you get out there and you put yourself in harm's way. And then Joel Embiid is hurt now. Now again, prayers up for Joel as we hope it's not something too serious, but— I'm sorry. Is that the goal? Is the goal putting people in harm's way just so they can qualify for an award? 'Cause I don't think that was the goal. Like, this man is actually dealing with an injury. Like, so again, because you're dealing with injuries for stretches of the season, You don't qualify? So I don't know, man. I don't think it's right. I think it's a tough rule to implement because like we travel crazy, we play a bunch of games. The speed of the NBA game today is totally different than it ever was before. All of a sudden you seeing hamstring, a lot more hamstring injuries, calf injuries, soft tissue injuries, all these different things, knees. And you got guys forcing it to get back so they can qualify because guess what? These awards are very much so attached to the amount of money that you can make. They're very much so attached to that. So it's gonna be interesting. You got a lot of NBA owners making huge investments into players and we're just throwing guys out there. Banged up just to meet these requirements. See, Tyrese Halliburton came back tonight, probably forced his way back a little bit earlier, not long ago, because he seen that those numbers start to creep up. And guess what he did? Went out for what, another 4 or 5 games before he came back tonight. So it's gonna get really interesting when you got these owners making, these owners of these teams making these huge investments into players and yet you gotta throw them in harm's way just because there's a 65-game limit. Like, we all know when somebody's egregiously just sitting and the difference when somebody's actually hurting. So if you don't have a core base of voters that can identify that, then maybe they shouldn't have a vote. Like, if you can't identify that, man, this guy's just been taking games off and taking games off and not giving, then just simply don't vote for him.
Yeah.
Because it is in the hands of the voters, right? So then just simply don't vote. But to throw guys in harm's way, I don't really bang with it. And now we got one of our premier faces in this league, the MVP of our league, possibly hurt for an extended period of time because he's forcing it. Because yeah, Of course he should be in the running for MVP. Damn right he should. And so I think it's whack. I get what people was trying to get at, but you got a lot of people making these rules that don't know how it feel to play it back to back. That don't know how it feel to play a third game in 4 nights. That don't know how it feel to play 5 and 7. But aside from— Knowing how it feels to actually compete in that amount of games, because I know people say, "Oh, that's your job." Number one, you take sick days and don't, and then go to work the next day. So shut up, we don't wanna hear it. But number two, again, when guys are actually hurting, it's a real thing. There was no debate that Joel Embiid was hurting tonight. I don't think anybody, that's up for debate for anyone. And then you have something like that happen, right? Like, I don't think it's right. I disagree with it. And it'll be interesting to see how far this thing goes because all of a sudden one of our main guys in this league, one of the faces of our league is out forcing it to try and it ain't so great now.
Yeah.
So we shall see. But as I said before, wishing the best to Joel. Prayers up. I hope to see him back on the court soon and hopefully it's nothing too serious.
