
What we need in perilous times like these is Draymond Green’s impassioned explanation defending FIFA’s fair play rule.
Or, more specifically, what he thinks of the fair play rule as it pertains to the Group G standings in the World Cup.
As you may have been alerted, England and Belgium are tied atop Group G and play each other Thursday with records so identical that, should they draw that match, the winner of the group and the apparently advantageous matchup in the start of the knockout stage will be decided by fair play points, which are numbers assigned to cards issued for misbehavior. A yellow card is valued at one point, a red card caused by two yellows is three, a straight red is four, and then a yellow followed by a straight red is five. The more points you get, the less fair your play is judged to be.
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Right now, Belgium has three yellows (Kevin DeBruyne, Jan Vertonghen and Thomas Meunier, all against Panama) to England’s two (Kyle Walker against Tunisia and Ruben Loftus-Cheek against Panama), which means that at the moment, England would win the group. The knee in the nethers, of course being, that depending on the other results, the winner could end up in the bracket with Brazil and Germany, the two pre-tournament favorites, thus making winning less desirable after all.
In other words, England and Belgium could conceivably see themselves in a battle Thursday to see who can kick the hell out of each other to avoid the Germans or Brazilians. And if they still can’t break the tie after breaking each others’ ankles, there would be a drawing of lots to determine the winner.
Now there’s fair play for you.
Now imagine the Warriors having a similar conundrum, in which amassing technical fouls would be to their benefit. As they led the NBA in the regular season and playoffs with 62, they would hold an almost insurmountable edge on nearly every other team (Cleveland, for example, finished with a mere 21, San Antonio 18, New Orleans 34, and Houston 40, just to line up the playoff opponents). Indeed, Green, with 20 by himself last year, would surely attempt to get more than the maximum of two, and could quite likely manage it.
And yet, if the Warriors needed the fair play points for a better matchup, Green could almost as surely manage to curb his impulses just as adeptly, because that is part of his diabolical genius.
But it would be hilarious to get his analysis on the fair play concept, if only to get him on the record asking the musical question, “Wait, you mean I HAVE to be nice to Tony Brothers for the good of the team? What the $%&?@!#! is THAT about?”
Hey, you have your concept of fun, and I have mine.