In an interview with Logan Murdock of The Ringer, Kevin Durant reflected on how the Golden State Warriors were presented as "KD and the Warriors."
“I was expecting—and maybe that’s my fault—I was expecting the beat writers, whoever was on the beat there, whoever covered the team, to integrate me into the Warriors’ way of doing things,” he says. “Because I never tried to step outside of that and make that situation bigger and make it all about me. I just felt like I wanted to be a part of the group. There were plenty of times where obviously when it comes to media, I was separated from the group.”
Durant signed a series of short-term contract with the Warriors and by the third season, it began to appear as though he was planning on leaving. Durant moved from the East Bay to San Francisco before the final season and he was more isolated.
“For people to look at me and say I was malcontent or isolated or didn’t look happy, I’m like, ‘Yo, do you all see Klay every day? Did you all see how he walked in there?’ But that was just him and nobody ever bat an eye at him,” Durant told The Ringer. “I loved it and I picked up on some of those things and how they approach the team-building and team bond. I’m like, ‘Oh, this is more my style.’ I was just adopting what the team was already doing.
“We all had our separate lives. We all had families,” he adds. “The Bay is huge. Draymond [Green] lived an hour and a half away from me, so does Steph, so does Shaun [Livingston]. When are we getting together? We’re around each other every day on the road. I think it’s healthy when you have that level of separation, when you get at home and like, ‘All right, you all go do your thing and I’m going to do mine.’”
