Kyrie Irving had a very difficult season last year. Due to the New York vaccine mandate, Irving was not allowed to play home games for the Brooklyn Nets as he was unvaccinated.
Irving eventually got to play regularly when the mandate was lifted. But before that happened, there was a lot of doubt surrounding Irving’s future with the Nets, and whether the franchise would try to ship him off to a different team.
In a clip from his interview on Kevin Durant’s ETCs podcast, Kyrie Irving revealed that he spent a lot of time thinking about what his future with the Nets was going to look like.
Irving mentioned that he didn’t know whether he was going to be traded or released by the Nets because he was ineligible to play home games. While Irving tried to stay positive, it did pose a real challenge for him (0:29 onwards).
.@KyrieIrving on not being able to play home games throughout most of the season:
"I never felt like I was 'back.' … I never felt like myself throughout this season."
New episode of #TheETCs drops 5/4. 🎙 pic.twitter.com/X0yvOgJkxv
— Boardroom (@boardroom) May 3, 2022
“I was sitting at home, wondering at home what my future was going to look like, whether I was going to get traded, whether I was going to be released, whether I was going to get an opportunity to be on another team. How I was going to spin this for myself in a positive way. I kept affirming to myself that things are going to change, people around me, I’m grateful to them for affirming that things were going to change.”
Kyrie Irving also noted in the clip that he didn’t feel like himself throughout the course of the NBA season. Irving clearly struggled with the idea of potentially being moved away from the Brooklyn Nets.
Now, Irving can continue playing games for the Nets and will shift his focus for the next season. Irving and the Nets will want to avenge their poor performance in the playoffs this year, so they will have a lot of work ahead of them to be able to set themselves up to do so.
