by David Zizmor

OAKLAND–The Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green is having a fantastic season he finished second in the voting for defensive player of the year. He’s really blossomed and has come into his own in kind of surprising fashion. At the beginning of the season David Lee was slated as the starter at power forward and then Lee hurt his back and was out for a couple of months and Green took his place the rest as they say is history.

The first two games against Memphis Green has been everything as advertised he’s guarded both Mark Gasol and Zach Randolph the big Memphis forwards. These guys have been key in the front court for the Grizzlies. It’s not an easy job Green really has got to push his energy levels to there limits and Gasol and Randolph might have to see him for over 40 minutes a night in this series because the Warriors don’t have a ton a guys whose effective against either of those guys.

Green gets in there he’s willing to do the dirty work against two of the best front court players in the NBA. Your talking about Gasol a guy whose been the NBA Player of the year a year ago and your talking about Randolph whose probably the best if not the best low post scorer at the power forward spot besides Tim Duncan.

These guys are fantastic and it takes every ounce of energy to keep these guys from dominating so Green is critical in this game. He had a tough game two, he did okay and Randolph and Gasol didn’t dominate him in either of the first two match ups. The thing they got to watch out for is Green gets into foul trouble. You go against guys who are that good your going to get fouled.

You just have to try and space them out you don’t want to get the foul too quickly, one thing we saw in game two is Green got two pretty quick fouls and they sent him to the bench to early. When he’s on the bench the Warriors have a lot of trouble getting the right combination of players in to stop those guys. Festus Ezeli, Andre Iguodala, these guys come in and they all try to do something.

Their just not as good at guarding those guys as Green is and Ezeli might have a shot he’s a big guy he’s got length he can man up against someone like Gasol or Randolph but he’s not as quick. He still doesn’t have as big a basketball IQ as Green does. What the Warriors really need is effective minutes from Ezeli because Lee isn’t going to cut it, Iguodala is not going cut it either he might be able to stop some passes but he’s not big enough to stop them in all plays all game long.

David Zizmor is the Golden State Warriors analyst for http://www.sportsradioservice.com catch his podcast below