Draymond Green is the proverbial front-runner for Defensive Player of the Year. On Saturday, before the Warriors beat Oklahoma City in Kevin Durant’s return, Green was aggressively defending the legacy of legends.

In the second episode of his Dray Day podcast with Uninterrupted — co-hosted by yours truly in a collaboration with Bay Area News Group — Green went off on New York Knicks owner James Dolan for his treatment of Charles Oakley.

Related Articles Draymond Green cheers LeBron James’ Charles Barkley rant “The man is a legend. Treat him as such,” Green said. “First off. This is Charles Oakley. Why is he buying a ticket?”

Green’s contention is that the Knicks organization was fine when Oakley’s blunt personality benefited the franchise. Oakley played 10 seasons for the Knicks and was beloved for his confrontational style.

But Oakley has been critical of the Knicks and their direction, leading to a poor relationship with owner James Dolan. That led to him being forcibly removed from Madison Square Garden. And Green was upset by how it was handled.

“You doing it for me, It’s all good,” Green said. “You doing it against me … you speaking out against my organization, it’s not good anymore? That’s a slave mentality. A slave master mentality. That’s ridiculous. It was all fine and dandy when he was laying people out, taking fines and all this stuff for your organization. But now all of a sudden when he says something that he feels, it’s a problem.”

Dolan crossed lines of class and professionalism by suggesting Oakley has addiction problems. It was slanderous and irresponsible for an NBA franchise to do such, especially without evidence. Dolan admitted he didn’t have proof for such a claim, and even if he did he shouldn’t have revealed it.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver brokered a meeting with Dolan and Oakley that included Michael Jordan via phone.

“And so, OK, say if they do know in the research they did that Oak has an anger problem,” Green said. “That’s not something that you say to the world. That’s not classy at all. … It’s not OK for you to go say to the world as a multibillion dollar organization. How can you even pin that on someone? Just throw that out there. That’s grimy. I think that’s wrong.”

Green was nearly as angered by Terrell Owens not making the Hall of Fame.

ON OWENS

“When I look at TO, he showed up every Sunday. The man showed up every Sunday no mater where he was. He never cheated the game. He was always in the best of shape. May have talked a lot. May have done a lot. May have antics. But nonetheless, he put in work.”

ON BRADY

“(People say) he has the greatest coach of all time. So did Michael Jordan,” Green said. “And no one talks about Phil having anything to do with Jordan’s success. … (Brady) is the GOAT. The reason I’m saying that is he was nothing at Michigan. … I don’t even acknowledge him as going to Michigan.”