In this episode of the Draymond Green Show, host Draymond Green, introduced by Colin Cowherd, covers a range of sports topics. He begins by promoting JJ Redick’s "Old Man and the Three" podcast, praising its authentic, uninterrupted conversation style. He then shifts to the NFL, recapping the historic divisional‑round weekend, especially the Chiefs‑Bills game and the rapid field‑goal finish, and raises the question of whether the NFL should adopt the college overtime format. Green shares his personal stance on re‑watching that game and reflects on the nature of offensive dominance. Moving to the NFL’s rising stars, he discusses Ja'Marr Chase’s impact and the controversy over college players sitting out bowl games, highlighting Shannon Sharpe’s defense of athletes and criticizing the double standard in how players are treated compared to coaches and GMs. The conversation then pivots to the NBA trade deadline, focusing on persistent Russell Westbrook trade rumors involving the Lakers, arguing that Westbrook is unfairly blamed for team struggles and that the league’s trade‑notification process is dehumanizing. Throughout, Green interweaves personal anecdotes, humor, and a call for more respect toward players across leagues.
Hi, it's Colin Cowherd. I started The Volume to bring you some of the most authentic voices in sports. While you're here, make sure you hit subscribe.
Thanks. Welcome back to the Draymond Green Show. This is our 10th episode, uh, milestone episode, uh, the number 10, which I am excited about. Uh, we got another great guest. One who's about to be named to his second All-Star Game and is also helping lead the Bulls to the top seed in the Eastern Conference. You know, they've gone from non-playoff team last year to right up there at the top of the Eastern Conference, a lot like us in the Western Conference. And so it's been beautiful to watch. And I also wanna shout out JJ, shout out JJ Redick. Shout out JJ. —And the Old Man and the Three podcast. Obviously we had JJ on, I think it was our second episode that we had JJ on. If you haven't heard that episode, it was an incredible episode. Definitely go back and check that out if you have not heard that one. But I highly recommend everyone checks out JJ's show this week because, you know, when you're doing these things, you can kind of feel like, "Alright, that was a good episode." And you can feel like, "Yo, we crushed that one." And I think, I get that feeling at times when we're doing our show, but I also got that feeling when I was recording JJ's show, "Old Man and the Three" with JJ and Tommy. I thought, number one, the conversation went on 60 minutes longer than it was supposed to go. And not one second, not one time was guys checking their phone to see what time it is, worried about the time. And that's how you know when you're in a great moment and you don't have anyone worried about the time or checking or, you know, JJ, they had a flight out. They came to San Francisco, they had a flight out. They weren't worried about their flight and checking the flight schedule because when you're in that moment, You have to really just embrace it and dive all the way into it. And that's how you create greatness in anything, not just in podcasting, in anything. And I thought that was what was going on the other day when we were recording Old Man and the Three. I thought it was a great segment. I thought it was fun. I enjoyed it. JJ and those guys, they had some great wine for us to drink. So it was an amazing time. So— Go check that out. Also check out episode number 2 of the Draymond Green Show if you haven't already. That was a great episode. JJ is, as we spoke about on that episode, he's kind of a pioneer in this podcast space for current players. And although he's not a current player anymore, I think he's been doing in the podcast space now for 6 years, which would take him to year 9, 8 or 9 of his career. And so he kind of, you know, made this, helped make this lane available to a lot of us. And it's been beautiful and he's done an incredible job. And so check that out, check both of those out. But before we get to Zach, as you know, we're gonna go around the association, but we're also gonna step out this outside of the association and talk a little NFL. And I think that's where we will start at. Man, that divisional round. Yeah. Was the craziest, not only divisional round in NFL history, but that was the craziest playoff weekend in NFL history. You're talking 4 walk-off scores. Like that doesn't happen. Like it just doesn't happen. And I think led by the absolute last game of the weekend, which were the Chiefs and Bills. I mean, Patrick Mahomes is insane. 13 seconds? Yeah. And you get down the field and get a field goal. That's unheard of. And you know, when you have things that happen like that in the game, all night, and I actually read the Bills coach Sean McDermott, he said, "I've watched those last 13 seconds a million times." And you either handle that one of two ways. Some people, for instance, myself, I have not watched the entire Game 7 of the NBA Finals to this day. Still haven't been able to watch the entire thing. And so I think you go one of two ways. You either don't watch it at all, which may not be the right thing to do 'cause it still lives in my head. 'Cause I don't think I've really laid it to rest. Or you're Sean McDermott and you're watching it over and over and over again, which I also don't think is the right thing to do 'cause you're reliving that moment. Over and over and over again. And obviously you have to watch film to improve. I personally just didn't think I needed to watch that one game to improve. Maybe I need to go back and watch it and just embrace it, I guess. But until that day, I will continue to stand on the side of not watching it, unlike Sean McDermott. But back to Patrick Mahomes and how, I mean, like—
Yeah.
You kind of knew the Bills were in trouble when he got that first 18-yard pass. And when he got that, picked up those 18 yards in the first down and they had a timeout to stop the clock, like you kind of knew like, all right, they are one pass away with Cheetah, with Travis Kelce, and with Patrick Mahomes at quarterback. They're coming up with these 15 to 20 yards that they need in order to kick or give Bucker a chance at the field goal. And then the Chiefs wins the coin flip. And when they win the coin flip, at that point, you know, whoever wins this coin flip, that's who's winning the game. Like neither one of these defenses are stopping these quarterbacks right now. We always talk about offense and defense and how great offense is going to ultimately beat great defense in most cases, unless Draymond Green is on defense and then it doesn't quite go that way. But you know, those quarterbacks both had it going and no defense was stopping them at that point. And so that then brings us to the rule. And you know, there's a lot of people discussing how the NFL needs to change the rule. And my question to everyone out there is, and obviously you can't answer here, but— Yeah. You know, if you wanna tweet me some answers or tweet some answers to the Volume and, you know, maybe we talk about 'em next week, maybe they're irrelevant, who knows. But is college football way of doing overtime better than the NFL? And should the NFL adopt what college football does or should they just go about it the way they go about it and then, but also just allow— Yeah. The Bills in this instance to have an opportunity to score. But then it kind of gets super long and you gotta think about the TV slots and like there's so many things that come into play when you're discussing this. And so, you know, a team goes down to score, i.e., Kansas City Chiefs, and then you give— And then you give Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills an opportunity. And they go down to score. Like, do you start back with a kickoff and then you go again? Like, because then that starts to run into other shows that the network may have, other games if there's other games on, you know, then you run into that issue. Or I mean, what if these quarterbacks go back and forth for, you know, 7 possessions in a row? That's severely gonna outweigh the time that— Draymond Green. That is allotted for an overtime. So do you scrap the overtime? Like there's a ton of things that we can discuss or you know, that the NFL can discuss, the changes they can, that can be made. But the reality is I personally don't think they're going to change it. I think that's kind of their way of going about it. They already made one change, which was if you get a field goal right there, then the other team has an opportunity to score. They already made that change. I can't really foresee them completely overhauling the rule. I just, I personally don't see it, but I don't know. I don't know. I thought the Cincinnati Bengals game was also an incredible game. And it is, it's incredible to see Joe Burrow, the way he's taken over that team. And Ja'Marr Chase is insane. Like Ja'Marr Chase. Yeah. Is so good. He's probably the best receiver in the NFL right now today as a rookie. And it's interesting because he sat out his last year at LSU. And I was wondering like, is he sitting out because he's not gonna have a great quarterback? Is he sitting out because he don't want to get hurt? And you know, most guys when they do stuff like that, they usually fall in the draft. Jamar Chase didn't fall. And rightfully so, because if you're judging that, if you're judging him off sitting out that last year and you miss Ja'Marr Chase, you have an even bigger issue on your hand. And I was recently listening to someone speak on guys sitting out of bowl games and Shannon Sharpe actually went in on it a little bit, Kirk Herbstreit. Was discussing some guys sitting out of the bowl games. And he was, I think it was the Ohio State wide receivers. And he was kind of destroying them. And Shannon Sharp went at him and I applaud Shannon for going at him that way. And one of the things Shannon said was, well, coaches change programs all the time. And you have all of these people leave on these kids. Or young student athletes. And then once the student athlete does it, it's a problem, you know? And Shannon went in about that and I thought it was great. Incredible. Because players aren't treated with the same respect that organization and coaches and general managers are. They're not given the same grace. That those people are given. Like I said, whether it's general managers, organizations as a whole, coaches, we're just not given that same grace as players. And I don't know if it's because of the clickbait, I don't know what it is, but I think it's ridiculous. And I was appreciative of the way Shannon went in on that topic. So yeah, man, I hope everyone enjoyed that weekend of football the way I enjoyed it. And now moving on to the association, obviously there are huge, huge, a lot, of Russell Westbrook trade talks, trade rumors going around. I know I saw yesterday the Houston Rockets were saying they would trade John Wall for Russell Westbrook and picks. And the reality is I'm not sure Russell Westbrook gets traded. I don't— I don't think so. I don't, if I'm guessing just as an NBA fan, I don't really foresee it happening, nor do I think it really should happen. You haven't really had the opportunity to see that team healthy and how they could grow together healthy. And I also don't like how Russell Westbrook gets all of the blame for everything going wrong. Like there's just,— it's just not possible that one guy is to blame for everything going wrong. So just been kind of keeping up with those trade rumors. As we know, it's that time in the NBA where trade deadline is approaching over the course of the next few weeks. So you're gonna hear more and more talks ramp up. You're gonna start to see deals made. And then obviously Russell Westbrook is the biggest name in any of these talks. So that's— and he's on the Los Angeles Lakers. So that's always gonna take the cake. And that's kind of who we've been hearing about the most in the trade rumors. So like I said, as a basketball fan, I am excited to see what happens at this trade deadline. And that's just not Russell Westbrook. That's just as a whole. I think that's always an exciting time. You have some guys find new beginnings, the new beginnings that they need and want. And then you have some guys that, don't quite find the new beginning that they're looking for and it doesn't go right. And that is the uncertainty of the trade market. Number one, you don't, you don't, most guys, probably 99% of guys has no say in where they're traded to. It just kind of happens. And a lot of guys find out they're traded on like Instagram and Twitter, which I think is ridiculous and needs to be changed, but it happens. DeMarcus Cousins found out in the interview after the All-Star Game in New Orleans that he had been traded to New Orleans. You know, and so you would think then because we are human beings that that rule would have been changed then. And yet it still hasn't. And so maybe one day it will get changed and we will be treated like the human beings that we are when being told that you have to uproot your family, your children, if you have children, your wife or girlfriend or fiancée or whatever it is, that life totally changes for you. And it'd be great as a human being that plays basketball and not just as a basketball player that we're viewed as, that if you could find that out the way you should find it out. And that's my hope for not only the NBA, but for all leagues, for anyone who goes through things like this.
That's definitely my hope.
Um, we'll see if it happens. And lastly, uh, around the association, there's also been these rumors about James Harden testing free agency, which— what a weird time for it to come out. Like, if he is going to test free agency, like, free agency doesn't start till July 1st. It's January. Uh, everybody's trying to do all they can to compete for a championship. And so I thought it was a very weird time for it to come out, but maybe it came out because if you do think James Harden is gonna leave, and actually I spoke to y'all about checking out JJ's podcast. So I'm not gonna go all the way into this because we discussed this on JJ's podcast, but I'll just sum it up quickly. Yeah. When Draymond Green left Cleveland and went to Miami, you no longer really see teams wait it out for free agents. They kind of move on if they know a guy isn't gonna resign. So maybe that's why it came out, but they are competing for a championship. So I don't know, I just thought it was a little weird that that came out at that time. But James Harden will be a free agent and he has the right to test free agency if that's what he wants to do. And no one can stop that. He will be an unrestricted free agent. So, um, stuff is getting interesting around the association, and as I said before, it is that time of year where you start to hear all these things. So buckle up your seatbelt because it sounds like it's about to be a wild ride on this trade deadline. So we shall see. But without further ado, I am going to turn this over— or not turn it over, but I am going to welcome in my brother NBA All-Star, one-time All-Star, soon to be two-time All-Star, Chicago Bulls slam dunk champion, All-NBA performer, Zach LaVine. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE]
