I never understood why Kevin Durant hitched his wagon to Kyrie Irving. I know they are friends and he never felt fully respected with the Warriors because that was always going to be Steph’s team, but it just didn’t seem like a great fit.
When I say great fit, I don’t mean on the court because Kyrie, when he is locked in, can be an A+ player, but it just seemed like Kyrie wasn’t always going to be focused on ball. James Harden is one of the more likable players in the NBA when it comes to other players liking him (sans the flopping), but he couldn’t even get along with Kyrie, according to The Athletic.
The Nets were in Cleveland Jan. 17. In their locker room before the game, Kyrie Irving lit ablaze some sage — a Native American ritual Irving has embraced in order to cleanse negative energy.
Harden, according to sources who were in the room when it happened, was seated in front of his locker, watching Irving, and looked at Kyrie like he had three heads.
In two seasons, Harden has quit on two different teams until they traded him. When he tries to explain this one, my guess is he will not come out and say, explicitly, that he wanted to be as far away from Kyrie as possible. But make no mistake, Irving had something to do with it.
Irving was ready for Harden to move on, too. When Irving heard Harden was in fact hoping to be traded, a well-placed source says he was eager to see it come to fruition.
Harden wasn’t fond of the city of Brooklyn and openly told people he missed life in Houston, where he was the king of the city, the nightlife, and strip clubs.
It is a strange scenario unless you are LeBron, when your skills diminish, they diminish quickly in the NBA (see Russell Westbrook). We will have to see what KD, Harden, Kyrie, and Ben Simmons have left in the tank because that will determine who won the trade.
Flip the pages for more about Kyrie and Harden.