Kevin Durant: Kyrie Irving 'stood up for himself' with trade request
As far as NBA blockbusters go, Kevin Durant wasn’t shocked by the Kyrie Irving trade or even the fact that the former Cleveland Cavaliers superstar had the temerity to request one earlier this summer.
In fact, Durant commiserated with Irving.
“When you’re around LeBron James, it’s so much that comes with that,” Durant said on the Bill Simmons podcast. “It’s so much outside distractions, conversations, just noise that just comes around from being around LeBron James. This whole season is going to be about if LeBron is going to leave or not. I'm ready for a new challenge. All that stuff kind of met at the pinnacle of why he wanted to leave. It just felt like he just wanted a situation where he could just be free from all that and just play.”
Durant, who won his first NBA championship and Finals MVP this past season, was widely ridiculed after leaving Oklahoma City. After the 2016 season – in which the Cavs landed their first title thanks in large part to Irving – the two spent time in Rio during the Olympics. Based off that time, Durant said he understood where Irving could be coming from.
“Kyrie reminds me of myself,” he said. “Just from the outside looking in, I may be wrong on all these things. But from the outside looking in, being around him for a month or so, he reminds me of myself as far as just loving to play the game, just wanting to learn it and try to get better at it every day.
“The NBA adds so much baggage on top of it from the businesses side to the media just to everything and when you just want to play and not worry about that stuff, you try to find a place where you could do that. And Kyrie, I’m sure he had to know that he was going to Boston. He wasn’t blindsided at all.”
It’s an interesting perspective and one that sheds light on Durant’s decision to leave the Thunder last summer to play for a team teeming with talent.
“He did what he was supposed to do in Cleveland," Durant said. "It’s on to the next chapter. I can really appreciate what he did. He stood up for himself, he showed a lot of courage.”
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The other side of the trade sent Isaiah Thomas, one of Boston’s most beloved Celtics, out of town following a career year, and one that saw him play through unimaginable heartbreak following the death of his sister. And just like that, with a major financial investment looming heading into next summer, the Celtics dealt him to the team they lost to in the Eastern Conference finals.
“I thought we all knew that,” Durant said when asked about lack of loyalty in sports. “It’s no loyalty. It’s business. It’s money involved. It’s loyalty to people. Those relationships that you had with like, sure, with trainers, teammates and anybody in the organization, that’s loyalty, that’s friendships, that’s relationships, that’s something that’s going to last forever. When it comes to numbers on the paper, name on the paper, at the end of the day that trumps everything.
“It’s like, why not dictate your future? They do it, the organizations do it, try do it. So why can’t you do it?”
Follow USA TODAY Sports' Michael Singer on Twitter @msinger
PHOTOS: Kevin Durant through the years
