Recently, Kevin Durant raised eyebrows when he claimed that offense is more important than defense in today’s NBA, with many pointing to last year’s Oklahoma City Thunder as direct evidence to the contrary. Golden State Warriors power forward Draymond Green has since fired back at those claims.

“Those who don’t believe defense is as valuable as it is, they simply just don’t win. I don’t think anyone’s ever really been hell-bent on caring about the opinion of those that don’t win, because your opinion equals zero,” said Green, per Sam Amick of The Athletic.

Green also called the Warriors’ defense when he and Durant were teammates “incredible.”

Durant took issue with that last remark, quote tweeting a post from NBACentral on X, formerly Twitter.

“And the offense was????” wondered Durant.

Indeed, that Warriors team with Durant, Green, Stephen Curry, and Klay Thompson is generally thought to be the most lethal offense of all time, although the team’s elite defense often gets lost in the conversation.

One user on X encouraged Durant to just concede that defense is an important part of the game.

“They understand what I’m saying but people purposely take my words outta context, u know mfers just wanna dunk on me lol,” replied Durant.

An interesting debate

The question of whether offense or defense is more important to winning championships has existed since the sport of basketball was invented, and of course, there is no consensus answer.

Last year’s NBA champion Thunder had one of the best defenses in modern NBA history, one that they used to suffocate opponents en route to hoisting the Larry O’Brien Trophy in June. Meanwhile, offensively talented teams like Durant’s Phoenix Suns that struggled to defend were often left by the wayside, in his case missing the playoffs altogether.

Teams like the Warriors in the mid-2010s featured the best of both worlds, and went on a dynastic run as a result. However, it doesn’t seem that Durant and Green will ever see eye to eye on this issue.