Draymond Green Won The NBA's 2025 Hustle Award Which Is Totally A Real Thing Despite Nobody Really Caring About It

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With about a month to go in the NBA's regular season, Draymond Green made a VERY public push for his DPOY candidacy. He basically went from a long shot to top 3 in the blink of an eye, which was our latest example of how powerful a narrative can be as we head into NBA award season. Once Wemby went down for the year (the actual DPOY), it was more of an open race where a handful of players had compelling cases, and unfortunately for Draymond, his narrative push could only do so much. Evan Mobley of the Cavs ended up winning it

which given how dominant his defensive season was, it made sense. Everyone knows Wemby would have run away with this award if not for his bloodclot, but it's still a cool achievement for Mobley as he becomes the youngest Cav to ever win DPOY.

While Draymond may have missed out on another DPOY that I'm sure he probably believes he was robbed of, the good news is the NBA threw him a bone! Congratulations to Draymond on winning the 2025 Hustle Award!

This is totally a real thing and basically is on par with all the other NBA awards in terms of value and importance if you ask me. Sure, nobody actually believes that since it's only been around since 2016, but you won't see me thumbing my nose at this prestigious award. Mostly because Marcus Smart won it 3 different times, and anything that helps me push his agenda is OK in my book.

When you think of the type of winners we've seen since 2016, Draymond does fit the description of the type of player who usually wins. For example, Alex Caruso won it last year, and we just saw what a monster he can be on the defensive end in terms of hustle/intangibles/winning plays. He basically ended the Grizzlies' season by himself in last night's 4th quarter all though hustle/defense/steals/winning plays etc.

So even though Draymond didn't win DPOY, he basically won DPOY-Lite. 

In the history of the award, only Marcus Smart has won DPOY and the Hustle Award in the same season. To be honest, they may as well just call this the Marcus Smart award. He's the only multiple winner (3), winning plays defined his entire Celtics tenure, seems like a no-brainer to me. I'm going to need that to be figured out. 

Anyone who watches the Warriors knows and understands that the way Draymond Green can impact the game defensively is what makes them so devastating. People always focus on Steph and the offense, but the true dominant Warriors teams built their foundation on defense. Your inability to score on them/turn the ball over is how they destroy you. First comes the stops, then comes the Steph dagger 3PMs. It's been that way for a decade at this point. 

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If you look at the criteria for this award

Players that "best utilize hustle to help their teams win on a nightly basis." The award is decided using a metric known as "hustle stats," which tracks defensive and offensive efforts such as diving for loose balls, taking charges, deflections, setting screens, and contesting shots

the selection of Draymond is…..interesting. Nobody doubts that he hustles/makes an impact. But if those are the criteria categories that determine this thing, there are some issues there

Loose Balls: Draymond only had 22 offensive loose balls recovered, and 23 defensive for a total of 45. Josh Hart led the NBA with 88, Dyson Daniels was 2nd with 79. So in this category, Draymond was not close.

Charges taken: Draymond only took 14 charges on the season. By comparison, Toumani Camara led the NBA with 31. Austin Reaves was next at 22. Draymond? He was 7th.

Deflections: Draymond finished with 180 deflections. If you think this is a great number, I'll inform you that Dyson Daniels led the NBA with 443. Next up? Keon Ellis at 274. Draymond was 27th.

Screens: Draymond finished with 124 screen assists and 328 screen points. Given the Warriors offense, we all know how important that is. The thing is, Sabonis led the NBA with 416 screen assists. Gobert was 2nd with 345. Shit, Kevon Looney was a more effective and consistent screener than Draymond. 

Contested Shots: Draymond finished with 616 contested FGA during the year, which isn't a terrible number. The thing is, Brook Lopez led the NBA with 1,093. Zubac was 2nd with 801. In this category, Draymond finished 13th

So when you look a little closer, it does start to feel like this was perhaps more of a sympathy award for missing out on DPOY/legacy award for Draymond. Based on all the things that go into this award, Draymond wasn't all that close to the lead in any of them. Don't we think production should matter with these things? But hey, maybe now he won't cry about DPOY and it saves us all from that bullshit.

Given the Warriors are most likely going to be without Jimmy Butler tomorrow night, they're going to rely on Draymond to live up to his new status as the Hustle Award winner. He's going to have to change the game on the defensive end/with hustle and find a way to win this Game 3 in the Bay. If he can't, well then this will look even more like a pity award.