The 2024-25 season certainly hasn’t gone according to plan for Kevin Durant and the Phoenix Suns. With another campaign set to end poorly for Durant, a fan on X called him out for leaving the Golden State Warriors because his ego got in the way. In response, the 15-time All-Star stated that he doesn’t have an ego and that the media has corrupted fans.
“I’m the most egoless player you’ve ever seen. Y’all just don’t know me well enough and let media corrupt your brains..shame on you.”
Durant, who is averaging 26.6 points, 6.0 rebounds, 4.2 assists, 0.8 steals, and 1.2 blocks per game this season, has always felt like he hasn’t been portrayed accurately by the media. He has clashed with the likes of Charles Barkley and Stephen A. Smith on numerous occasions over the years.
Durant once claimed that media members would rejoice when he retires. To say he doesn’t have a great relationship with a lot of them would be an understatement.
As for why Durant left the Warriors in 2019 after winning two titles in three seasons, well, a lot of reasons have been thrown around for it. The one most commonly put forward is the infamous argument between him and Draymond Green. Green himself once asked Durant if the argument was why he left.
“It wasn’t the argument, it was the way everybody acted like it didn’t happen,” Durant said. “Steve Kerr acted like it didn’t happen. Bob Myers tried to discipline you and think that that would put the mask over everything. I really felt like that was such a big situation for us as a group.
“The first time we went through something like that,” Durant stated. “We had to get that s*** all out. I remember watching ‘The Last Dance,” and when Scottie didn’t go into the game, the whole team in the locker room said, ‘Scottie that was f****d up that you did that.’ We needed that.
“We just needed to throw all of that s*** out on the table and say, ‘Yo, Dray, K, that was f****d up that we even had to go through that. Let’s just wipe our hands of that and go finish the task.’ I don’t think we did that,” Durant continued. “We tried to dance around it.
“I just didn’t like how all of that, just the vibe between all of that, it just made s*** weird to me,” Durant added. “And I’d rather us, be who we say we are. Family first. Communication is key. Like we didn’t show that. And that’s what rubbed me the wrong way more than anything.”
Whatever the reason may have been, leaving the Warriors has certainly ended up being a bad move by Durant. He hasn’t even made the Conference Finals since then and is almost certainly not getting that far this year either.
The Suns are 11th in the West with a 35-42 record and are arguably the most disappointing team of the season. It’s extremely unlikely that they’ll even make the playoffs, especially with Durant being out with an ankle injury. He has missed the last two games, and the Suns lost both of them.
