It’s officially Super Bowl week, and for the first time since 2012, the Golden State Warriors neighbor, the San Francisco 49ers, will represent the NFC side in the big game.
With the Warriors struggling throughout the 2019-20 NBA season, the 49ers have acquired the Bay Area’s championship baton. However, one Warrior has connections to the 49ers’ opponent, the Kansas City Chiefs.
One an NBA player, one an NFL player, each from rival colleges, Frank Clark and Draymond Green, may not seem like they have much in common on the surface. Nevertheless, according to the Kansas City Chiefs edge rusher, although the two went to rival universities, they’ve been close since college.
At Super Bowl “Opening Night” in South Beach, Clark spoke about his bond with the Warriors’ Defensive Player of the Year.
Me and Draymond, we’ve been tight, tight friends since college — I know he went to Michigan State, I went to Michigan, you know, bitter rivals, but at the end of the day, the friendships come before all of that as we developed a close friendship early on in college.
Clark said Green played a “big brother role” for him throughout college and mentored the young Michigan Wolverine product, showing him “the right way to do things.”
He assumed that big brother role and was just showing me the ropes, you know, I didn’t understand — I was a troubled kid, getting into a lot of stuff and he stepped in and kind of filled that role as one of the guys that was mentoring me and just showing me the right way to do things.
Although Green has always been there for Clark through his career, the two shared some fights before they blossomed into “brothers.”
Hats off to him, he’s always been there my whole career supporting me through the ups and the downs — never left my side and I’m always thankful for that — It started with a few fights first, I’m going to be honest — We had to fight a little bit before we got close, but we put the college stuff to the side — I still get on him from time to time, you know, Michigan is kindof better than Michigan State right now in basketball and football, so I give him a lot of stuff — but it’s all love at the end of the day, that’s my brother.
The San Francisco 49ers will face Clark and the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl on Sunday, February 2, in Miami, Florida, with a chance to bring a championship back to the Bay Area.