Kevin Durant has been heavily criticized in the past for trying to have easy paths to championships, although he hasn’t won a championship since 2018 when he was still a member of the overpowered Golden State Warriors.
He has formed two superteams on the Brooklyn Nets, first with Kyrie Irving and James Harden, before the team replaced Harden with Ben Simmons. Either way, KD hasn’t been able to get past the second round of the playoffs, which has earned him a lot of criticism from fans and analysts.
After the Golden State Warriors won the 2022 NBA championship, Charles Barkley called him a ‘bus rider’ for using other people to have success and then taking the credit. Even Klay Thompson defended him against those claims, but that hasn’t changed anything.
Kevin Durant Fires Back At Those Who Say He Became Successful Thanks To Other People
Now, KD has fired back at those comments, making it clear that he doesn’t ‘ride coattails’ and he’ll never do it while he remains active. Talking with Michael Lee of the Washington Post, Durant revealed how he felt after many people said he took advantage of other people to be successful.
“I hated that,” Durant says. “Riding coattails? That’ll never happen when I’m playing basketball. Either I’m going to step back, so you can go ahead and do your thing, or I’m going to take control.”
He then revealed that it was hard for him to see the Golden State Warriors winning the NBA championship, not because he hated them, but because people would make things about him leaving that squad and having no success on the Nets.
“I can’t lie: Watching the Finals, I knew so many people would turn their focus on me once they won. I was like, I hate that they won, because y’all not going to make it about them; it’s going to be all about me,” Durant says. “I think it’s just a childish way of looking at that experience. I feel like you can take it all in and appreciate what they did and not even talk about me. I was just sitting at home. But I get how it is.”
Durant remains a great player, and he’s having a heavily underrated season with the Nets. After the Steve Nash and Kyrie Irving dramas are over, it’s time for Durant to show that he can lead the Nets to the championship and prove everybody wrong with a title.
This season is still young, but if he keeps this level come playoff time, the Nets will have a huge chance to win it all next year.
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