Draymond Green: Cavs’ Jarrett Allen ‘gets really, really, really soft’ in playoffs

Draymond Green isn’t one to hold back. So when he starts talking basketball on his podcast, you generally know what’s coming. This time, it was the Cavaliers — and more specifically, Jarrett Allen.

Green weighed in on the Cavs’ first-round series against the Toronto Raptors, which is tied at 2-all entering Wednesday’s Game 5 in Cleveland. And he didn’t exactly sugarcoat things.

Toronto wasn’t great in Game 4. The Cavs were worse.

“After a great start with James Harden and Donovan Mitchell … they’ve cooled off a bit,” Green said. “Jamal Shead has been great defensively for the Raptors. Collin Murray-Boyles has been great on the offensive end …”

Then he got to Allen.

“Jarrett Allen seems to get into these playoffs and get really, really, really soft, man,” Green said. “Like, he gets into the playoffs and turns into a completely different player. And not for the better.

“He gets really, really, really soft in these playoff games, and I just don’t understand it. Collin Murray-Boyles understands it, though. He says, ‘I’m going right at your chest.’”

Allen averaged 15.4 points and 8.5 rebounds in 56 regular-season games and was coming off one of the best stretches of his career following the February trade that brought in Harden.

But through four playoff games, those numbers have dipped to 8.8 points and 7.3 rebounds. He did grab 15 boards in the Game 4 loss, but the overall impact hasn’t quite been the same. He finished that game with three points on 1-of-5 shooting.

Meanwhile, Green and the Warriors are watching from home. Cavs coach Kenny Atkinson knows Green well from their time together in Golden State (Atkinson was an assistant from 2021-24).

Bottom line? It’s the kind of criticism that’s going to follow Allen until he proves otherwise in the postseason. Fair or not, that’s how it works.

And now it’s coming from a player who’s built his reputation on bringing it when the games matter most.

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