National Basketball Association

Smith pays price for football move on Green in Game 5

Published Jun. 14, 2015 8:47 p.m. ET

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J.R. Smith entered Game 5 of the NBA Finals with two flagrant fouls in this postseason and a whole lot of missed shots in this series.

Coming off the bench in Oakland, he quickly gave the Cleveland Cavaliers a spark with two quick 3-pointers and the scoring touch needed to take the pressure off LeBron James. But for good measure, he also picked up his third flagrant foul -- a flagrant 1.

This time, he ran through a first-quarter screen by Golden State's Draymond Green the way Jim Brown ran through defenders in his prime in Cleveland -- he just put his shoulder down and worried about the carnage later.

You can see the play here.

This flagrant foul was significant because if Smith picks up another flagrant foul point, he will be suspended.

With Cleveland’s lack of depth, they cannot afford to miss Smith for any games the way they did at the beginning of their series with the Bulls. This is what Smith did against the Celtics to get his first suspension during the playoffs.

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