Draymond Green is right. NBA discipline is getting bizarre.

Among the debris from Malice at the Palace 13 years ago was perhaps the most concrete, black-and-white commandment the NBA has in its rulebook: Thou shalt not leave the bench area during an altercation.

What’s odd is that players leaving the bench area to join an on-court melee wasn’t what turned that Friday night in Detroit into a historic moment of violence. The bigger problem was players going into the stands and fans coming onto the court. Rules against that, of course, had already existed.

But the league cracked down on players leaving the bench area to further tamp down on-court brawls. The thinking goes that harshly penalizing players who join a fracas from the bench deters them; that keeps any fisticuffs to a maximum of 10 players. It makes sense in theory, and you could argue that the rule has helped limit the number of actual fights in the NBA in the 13 years since Malice.

It wouldn’t be a strong argument — the incredible suspensions and penalties that stemmed from Malice seem more likely to be responsible — but it’s an argument.

However, it’s quite possible that the fallout from Friday’s bout between the Wizards and Warriors has shown just how skewed the NBA’s punishment scheme has become.

After some normal tit-for-tat physicality on a box-out, Bradley Beal smacked Draymond Green, perhaps with only partial intention. Green wrapped him up as they shuffled to the stanchion. Neither appeared to get a swing in on the other after Beal’s initial smack.

But here came the rest of the Wiz and Warriors. Kelly Oubre, of all people, ran in swinging. He...hit his teammate John Wall in the back of the head. Video indicates he also swung at Klay Thompson and at the very least exacerbated the situation by wrapping up a player on the other team. In these situations, you’re supposed to get your own dudes out of there.

Meanwhile, Carrick Felix, a fringe NBA player catching a DNP, took two steps toward the fight along the baseline. He caught a one-game suspension from the league. Markieff Morris, in street clothes while recovering from hernia surgery, got into the middle of the fracas. He caught a one-game suspension from the league. The NBA hit Beal with a $50,000 fine, Green with a $25,000 fine, and Oubre — the worst actor in the whole thing, in my book — with a $15,000 fine and no suspension.

Needless to say, Green was livid. He has a point.

Green has a history, and the NBA has shown it will be harsh on repeat offenders. The only prominent player with a longer rap sheet in the league office than Green is DeMarcus Cousins. Both are penalized beyond normal bounds precisely because both have more incidents on the record.

That is still no excuse for Green being fined more than Oubre in this incident.

The NBA wants to avoid big fights. It has established rules and penalties to deter players from engaging in big fights. But some of these rules are disproportionately rigid compared to others. You would think the NBA would be rather steadfast in punishing players who swing their fists during altercations! That seems like a core tenet of anti-fight policy. Yet Oubre swings wildly and walks away with only a minor financial penalty.

Meanwhile, Felix and Morris simply leave their invisible box in the heat of the moment, do nothing to further inflame the altercation happening near them, and — because the NBA’s bench rules are so rigid — will lose a game check for their trouble.

The actual violations committed by Oubre and the duo of Felix and Morris are as disproportionate as the penalties assessed on each, but completely upside down. Add in Green getting fined more than Oubre, and it looks even more ridiculous. Green is right: That just doesn’t add up.

There are two problems here. The first is that the NBA uses its discretion in assessing discipline in many cases but uses no discretion in cases of players leaving the bench during altercations. This creates an environment where you can have absurd juxtapositions like a fringe NBA player such as Felix losing a game check for taking two steps in the wrong direction while Oubre gets a minor citation for swinging fists around.

The second is that the NBA clearly needs to better define what players are supposed to do during minor dust-ups. After watching the donnybrook a few dozen times, it’s impossible to figure out what Green could have done differently. The NBA says he failed to disengage. That’s true: When he got smacked in the face, he didn’t smile and ask for another.

But he didn’t swing back, he didn’t go nuts, he didn’t retaliate. He wrapped Beal up. He did not disengage, no. But he did not escalate the situation.

Punishing Green’s actions with an outsized fine while lowballing Oubre’s punishment creates a perverse incentive: It’s now less costly to leap into battle swinging fists than it is to, uh, have a pre-existing disciplinary record? What’s dangerous about the NBA’s decision here is not that Green will truly suffer for being out $25,000. It’s that the Wizards have laid out a playbook for other teams to use in getting Green in the crosshairs.

This is a precedent: Other players can target Green knowing that his punishment will be larger relative to the infraction. He can’t wrap up an aggressor without catching penalties. That truly does open him up for cheap shots from opponents.

Perhaps you think Green, an artist of the form, has it coming. Perhaps you think this is overblown. But inconsistency in these matters is what leads to bigger problems. Green is stewing, other players will notice the light punishments Beal and Oubre drew, and this could very well come back to bite the NBA.