Enes Kanter just wanted to go play some pickup with one of the best players on the planet, and go home.
Unfortunately, that player is Kevin Durant & that “home” is OKC; where Durant left the Thunder high & dry before joining the rival Warriors & leading them to a championship.
Kanter appeared on Taylor Rook’s podcast TIMEOUT & revealed that when some of his Thunder teammates found out he was traveling to The Big Apple last month to play with a group, including Durant; one teammate in-particular felt some kind of way about it:
Kanter: “The first game, I told my coach, Make sure I’m on LeBron’s team because—I’m not going to tell who—one of my teammates, a couple weeks before that scrimmage game, said, ‘If I see one picture of you and KD’—because he knows that KD lived in the same apartment as me—‘don’t come back to OKC.’” […]
The teammate has a lot of animosity toward Kevin, I would imagine…
Kanter: “Yes, and then actually after the scrimmage game, 45 minutes later, he called me and said, ‘Did you talk to him?’ Because he heard about the game.
“So he asked me if I talked to him, if I was friendly or not, if I was on his team.
“I was like, I was not on his team.
“He was like, ‘You’re lying, I [saw] you on his team.’
“I was like, Alright, maybe I was on his team for a little bit.”
That player is undoubtedly Russell Westbrook.
Although Kanter never spills the beans, what other player on the Thunder even has that type of personality? What other player was visibly betrayed & upset about Durant’s departure?
When the Warriors played the Thunder last year, Westbrook was the one in Durant’s grill in between whistles..then others joined in.
The entire podcast can be heard below, with the situation being detailed around the 4:18 mark: