Should Durant Switch Teams Now?

[RoyceDa59]

I just would have meant so much more if he brought a championship to OKC. They were so close a few times and went through the trials and tribulations. I honestly think they could have won last year if he stayed. I don't hate Durant and I respect his abilities as a player, but as a fan of the game I can't seem to put as much stock in last years playoff run as if he'd stuck it out with Westbrook and finally overcome their rivals.


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[michaelm]

Oh! I know moral grandstanding when I see it! Your clearly genuine concern means a lot to me. Let me go call a therapist and tell them that some guy online told me he was worried about my mental health because I kept calling into question the public perception of his favorite professional athlete. Will let you know how it goes.

Nothing worse than cod psychology, particularly on a sports discussion forum.

If you want an example of irony however, given the posting history of some of your fellow travelers on here, calling the KD apologists on this forum relentless is difficult to surpass.

Agree @ the psychology/mental health diagnosis bit, but yesh has pulled that back, so no worries. As far as relentless, you comment on almost all my KD posts. Just sayin'. I don't deny being relentless on the topic. The irony was in how you guys refuse to concede, while relentlessly coming to the defense of a guy who is criticized for being anti-competitive and conceding too easily. I actually wasn't using irony in a hypocritical or condemning way, but rather truly ironic.

I deliberately referred to your fellow travelers, since several of them do just post the same thing over and over, in some cases several times a day, rather than presenting anything in the way of a cogent argument, something you actually assay. I pretty much agreed with your post on the other thread as you know.

Like Yesh, I see myself as responding to unfair criticism, which I consider those who attempt to make Durant's career choice into a moral/character issue by accusing him of cowardice to be engaging in, and am not on here promoting Durant de novo; if I am a fanboy I am actually a Curry fanboy more than a Durant fanboy.

I have my own reasons for replying to the Durant bashing, partly that I find it annoying as you do the Durant apologia, and not logically based in most cases, and consider it no bad thing to have counter arguments out there, whether or not there is any point to them being on this particular forum. I also saw another sportsman in another sport of whom I was a particular fan retire prematurely because he got jack of similar criticism, in his case after nearly all the criticism was proven to be entirely wrong; the latter won't happen with Durant of course because what we are debating are mostly matters of opinion and perception.

[MoMan24]

Those Celtics were so good, Kevin Durant told me he is going to join them next season. (In Peyton Manning voice). People are joking about it on huge nationally televised sports award shows, and Twitter, Facebook, etc were all blowing up with the same sentiment. Whether KD is in on it or not, it's part of his image. People keep trying to say it's some small fringe group of people who doesn't respect what KD did, but it's almost everybody outside of Warriors fans. Even my friends who defend KD's decision to a pretty annoying extent say that his championship is not as meaningful as championships usually are to them. That doesn't mean he was wrong, but as of right now it's pretty disconnected to think his reputation hasn't been affected.

Yes this is very true.

What matters more our opinions in RealGM or the increase in KD merchandise sales. More corporate sponsorships and parnerships.
Outside a certain age demographic and outside this country his reputation IMO had not taken a hit.

Plus 20 yrs from now many new fans won't remember he played for OKC outside OKC if he plays for 7 in GS with 4 championships.

In my neighborhood switch sides or backstabbing is called "the KD". Everyone I speak to thinks what he did was a punk move. The only people who refuse to see it are KD or GSW stans. It is by no means a small group, it is the exact opposite. He won a title good for him. He will win another one this coming season, but me and many others have no respect for his titles. There is the path of least resistance, and then their is the KD route. It shocks me how people are still blind to the general thinking on KD.

[nbafan38]

Yes this is very true.

What matters more our opinions in RealGM or the increase in KD merchandise sales. More corporate sponsorships and parnerships.
Outside a certain age demographic and outside this country his reputation IMO had not taken a hit.

Plus 20 yrs from now many new fans won't remember he played for OKC outside OKC if he plays for 7 in GS with 4 championships.

In my neighborhood switch sides or backstabbing is called "the KD". Everyone I speak to thinks what he did was a punk move. The only people who refuse to see it are KD or GSW stans. It is by no means a small group, it is the exact opposite. He won a title good for him. He will win another one this coming season, but me and many others have no respect for his titles. There is the path of least resistance, and then their is the KD route. It shocks me how people are still blind to the general thinking on KD.

Agree, I don't think people care or as as angry at him as on realgm but the perception I've heard in general is he went to the best team and won a ring, like of course he's going to win, not really wow what an accomplishment by KD.

[SDANNIE]

In my neighborhood switch sides or backstabbing is called "the KD". Everyone I speak to thinks what he did was a punk move. The only people who refuse to see it are KD or GSW stans. It is by no means a small group, it is the exact opposite. He won a title good for him. He will win another one this coming season, but me and many others have no respect for his titles. There is the path of least resistance, and then their is the KD route. It shocks me how people are still blind to the general thinking on KD.

It's true all over the world. I was in China last November. The bellhop in my hotel in Xi'an China asked me if I liked basketball one morning. He could not speak English, but he could understand it pretty well. We communicated through an app on his phone where he would speak in Chinese, the phone would type the text in mandarin, he would check it for accuracy and then translate it to English for me to read. I told him I was a fan of the OKC Thunder. He pulled up a picture of KD, Westbrook, Harden and Ibaka all in the uniforms of the teams they currently play for. We talked a little about what could have been, then he pointed to KD and started talking into his phone. He had trouble finding the right words but he finally showed me the translation and it said "They say he is a traitor." And then he nodded his head. True story.

And then there is this -

Read on Twitter

A little hard to see the poster but apparently it had a picture of a cupcake, a snake and Westbrook's motto "Why Not?"

Oh KD, I almost feel bad for you. But only almost.

[MintFresh]

I just would have meant so much more if he brought a championship to OKC. They were so close a few times and went through the trials and tribulations. I honestly think they could have won last year if he stayed. I don't hate Durant and I respect his abilities as a player, but as a fan of the game I can't seem to put as much stock in last years playoff run as if he'd stuck it out with Westbrook and finally overcome their rivals.


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It'd be worth more if he brought a championship to Seattle if Seattle ever gets an expansion team

[michaelm]

I just would have meant so much more if he brought a championship to OKC. They were so close a few times and went through the trials and tribulations. I honestly think they could have won last year if he stayed. I don't hate Durant and I respect his abilities as a player, but as a fan of the game I can't seem to put as much stock in last years playoff run as if he'd stuck it out with Westbrook and finally overcome their rivals.


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No problem at all with this, except I don't think he was ever going to win a title at OKC which he had tried to do for 9 years.

[michaelm]

double

[Patches Perry]

Nothing worse than cod psychology, particularly on a sports discussion forum.

If you want an example of irony however, given the posting history of some of your fellow travelers on here, calling the KD apologists on this forum relentless is difficult to surpass.

Agree @ the psychology/mental health diagnosis bit, but yesh has pulled that back, so no worries. As far as relentless, you comment on almost all my KD posts. Just sayin'. I don't deny being relentless on the topic. The irony was in how you guys refuse to concede, while relentlessly coming to the defense of a guy who is criticized for being anti-competitive and conceding too easily. I actually wasn't using irony in a hypocritical or condemning way, but rather truly ironic.

I deliberately referred to your fellow travelers, since several of them do just post the same thing over and over, in some cases several times a day, rather than presenting anything in the way of a cogent argument, something you actually assay. I pretty much agreed with your post on the other thread as you know.

Like Yesh, I see myself as responding to unfair criticism, which I consider those who attempt to make Durant's career choice into a moral/character issue by accusing him of cowardice to be engaging in, and am not on here promoting Durant de novo; if I am a fanboy I am actually a Curry fanboy more than a Durant fanboy.

I have my own reasons for replying to the Durant bashing, partly that I find it annoying as you do the Durant apologia, and not logically based in most cases, and consider it no bad thing to have counter arguments out there, whether or not there is any point to them being on this particular forum. I also saw another sportsman in another sport of whom I was a particular fan retire prematurely because he got jack of similar criticism, in his case after nearly all the criticism was proven to be entirely wrong; the latter won't happen with Durant of course because what we are debating are mostly matters of opinion and perception.

Fair points - I'm glad we understand each other.