In an ultimate show of support, Draymond Green will vote for his teammate Zaza Pachulia to be a starter of the Western Conference team in this year's All-Star Game.
In the first release of fan voting, which came out on Thursday, Pachulia was second to teammate Kevin Durant with 439,675 votes, as far as the West's frontcourt is concerned.
When asked if he can believe that his center has made it that high in the voting ladder, Green chuckled and said:
“Yeah, I can believe it,” Green told reporters during Friday morning's shootaround. “He just won't tell me how he keeps doing it… whatever he's doing… he won't share the wealth.”
As a member of the Dallas Mavericks, Pachulia was close to taking Green out of the running for an All-Star nod last season, the Warriors' defensive anchor reflected on the difference between both occasions.
“It definitely pissed me off last year,” Green said with a smile. “…and this year is funny.”
Anthony Slater of the San Jose Mercury News brought up how the league made the change to a 50-25-25 voting split on the ballots because of that very instance last season that almost put out an All-Star out of his deserved place in its festivities because of a fault in their voting system.
“It's the Zaza rule,” Green said. “I don't know how he's gonna work against that one though — he's got a lot of votes.”
After a quick explanation of the voting split, the 6-foot-7 forward couldn't help but put himself in his teammate's shoes.
“If I was Zaza, I'd be pissed.”
When asked if he intended to vote for the Georgia international, the Saginaw native was sure-headed.
“I'm definitely voting for Zaza,” he joked. “We're gonna start campaigning for him so the players would vote for him too.”
While the expectation is that the weight of the players and media vote will cancel out the massive amount of votes Pachulia has received thus far, if the Warriors come up with a charismatic campaign, the 6-foot-11 center might just slip through the cracks, which could come costly to other forwards and centers deserving of the nod.
All-Star mentions are as close to gold as they've ever been, especially now that they've become a major part to whether a player can become a max-worthy signing or not.
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