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Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green was not part of the NBA All-Star Game, but he still grabbed lots of attention, thanks to his mouth. The outspoken four-time NBA champion had a lot to say about the state of the NBA All-Star game, which introduced a new tournament-style format for the 2025 edition of the event. Among his gripes was the fact that a group of “Rising Stars,” including Los Angeles Lakers small forward Dalton Knecht, was able to see action on Sunday against legitimate All-Star players.
“These young guys, if they're on the rising stars team, they don't deserve the privilege of playing on Sunday,” Green said
Knecht was later informed of Green's comment and had an interesting reaction to it.
“Draymond said that?” the Lakers rookie told reporters (h/t Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic). “He's just talking,” the former Tennessee Volunteers star added.
Knecht was among the players on Candace Parker's Rising Stars team that went up against Shaquille O'Neal's Team OGs in the semifinals. Unfortunately for Knecht and company, they failed to pull off an upset against Shaq's LeBron James-less squad, which pulled off a 42-35 win to advance to the finals. Knecht, who was taken in the first round (17th overall) of the 2024 NBA draft by the Lakers, scored a total of eight points on 3-for-6 shooting from the field and hit two 3-pointers on four attempts from behind the arc while adding two rebounds in 11 minutes of action in that contest.
The NBA decided to apply a new format for the 2025 NBA All-Star Game with the hopes of fixing a recurring issue about the lack of intensity among the event's participants. Perhaps the NBA thought that letting up-and-coming players, hungry for success and recognition amid their young pro careers, could help solve the problem, but it appears that fans still have mixed reactions to the quality of the NBA All-Star Game.
For what it's worth, Shaq's team ended up winning the tournament by beating Charles Barkley's Global Stars via a score of 41-25.
As for the 23-year-old Knecht, the future remains bright for him. He'll have his chances of making it to the NBA All-Star Game as an actual All-Star. So far in the 2024-25 NBA regular season with the Lakers, Knecht is averaging 9.4 points and 3.0 rebounds per game while shooting 46.4 percent from the floor.