Draymond Green slams Hornets for LaMelo Ball's usage, accuses them of tanking

The Charlotte Hornets are playing some inspiring basketball of late, but Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green apparently sees it differently.

After basically calling out Hornets head coach Charles Lee following their matchup with Charlotte last week, saying, "I've seen coaches get fired for playing defense like that," he took the disrespect a step further recently on his podcast, questioning the Hornets' desire to win.

Draymond Green’s recent thoughts on the Charlotte Hornets:

“The Charlotte Hornets is a team that’s tanking right in front of your face…that fact that they have LaMelo Ball coming off the bench, I found that very interesting” 👀 pic.twitter.com/JMbtJVR8p9
— Kyle Ingram (@SnapshotKyle) January 19, 2026

“The Charlotte Hornets is a team that’s tanking right in your face in plain sight. The fact that they have LaMelo Ball coming off the bench, I found very interesting," Green said. "They are a much worse team and so easy to guard when LaMelo’s not on the floor. When we played them in Charlotte, LaMelo had it going. He hit multiple threes in a row, he had got their team going, and then in the third quarter, he came out at about the five-minute mark, maybe, and did not come back in the game, no matter what was going on, until the fourth quarter with four minutes left. There’s nothing to explain. Like, why is there nothing to explain about that? LaMelo Ball is on a max contract. One of the young, talented guys in this league, and there’s nothing to explain about that? I saw that, and I was like, that’s weird. To me. That’s tanking right in front of your face. In plain sight.

Making the assumption that a team is tanking while having won five of its last nine games, with dominating wins over teams like the Thunder, Lakers, and Nuggets, is certainly interesting timing. Could Draymond still be sour about how the Hornets defended them the other night? Possibly. Is he also misinformed? Yes. Either that or he's trying to push out a narrative that he knows isn't true.

The Hornets are not benching LaMelo or kicking him to the bench because it increases their chances of losing a game. They're doing it so he can stay healthy and play in the final minutes of a game when the team needs him most. Charles Lee is only doing this in back-to-back situations, and it is something that Ball, himself, signed off on.

The Hornets could just sit Ball for the entire game like other teams do with their stars, which has become known as load management. But no, you don't see that. If healthy, Ball is out there, and you'd rather they take the safe approach, considering the injury history with his ankles. If he were sitting out entire games against teams they should beat, then yeah, it'd be "weird," as Green called it.

There's not a single thing about the way this group has played over the last two months that screams — TANKING!

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