In Saturday night’s game against the Golden State Warriors, Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Russell Westbrook faced a slight injury scare. Warriors center Zaza Pachulia fell on top of Westbrook’s legs, seemingly for no reason at all. Westbrook’s take on the situation: Pachulia was trying to injure him. From ESPN’s Marc J. Spears:
“Obviously it was intentional. He fell over my leg. He tried to hurt me,” Thunder guard Russell Westbrook said about Warriors center Zaza Pachulia. Westbrook also acknowledged that he thought Pachulia was a dirty player.
Westbrook added that nobody touched Pachulia, which seems true, although, as a Redditor points out, an alternate angle of the play makes it look as though Pachulia had his knee hooked by Warriors swingman Nick Young’s foot.
Here’s the play in question:
Zaza just fell hard on Russell Westbrook's legs on purpose… pic.twitter.com/BwXaCbFZgD
— Justin Jett (@JustinJett_) February 25, 2018
Here’s video of Westbrook’s response:
Russell Westbrook was asked if Zaza Pachulia is a dirty player:
“Yeah. For sure. For sure.”
(via @royceyoung) pic.twitter.com/aWwOTdZKPt
— Def Pen Hoops (@DefPenHoops) February 25, 2018
Pachulia did not agree with Westbrook’s claim, calling the star guard’s accusation “childish,” per Mark Medina of the Mercury News:
After reading Westbrook’s quotes from a reporter’s phone, Pachulia just shook his head before calling Westbrook’s accusations “childish.”
“I don’t want to go back and forth on those kind of things,” Pachulia said. “That’s not the case.”
This isn’t the first time Pachulia has been accused of trying to injure a player or make a dirty play. Nor is it the second, third or fourth time. Paul George has Westbrook’s back on this one; the Thunder forward cited Pachulia’s dirty past:
Paul George on the Pachulia play: “I’m going to take the Russ approach: Did you see what happened? You know Zaza, you know his history. Nobody pushed him. He aimed his fall … He’s on the end of hurting a lot of guys.”
— Royce Young (@royceyoung) February 25, 2018
Fellow All-Star point guards Damian Lillard and Kyrie Irving are with Westbrook on this one too:
BS play smh https://t.co/AqmCjfemWQ
— Damian Lillard (@Dame_Lillard) February 25, 2018
Kyrie Irving has thoughts on Pachulia falling on Westbrook’s leg: “that s*** is ridiculous” pic.twitter.com/fPJayhbzT4
— Fred Katz (@FredKatz) February 25, 2018
