Durant does not have what it takes to win

[bdonovan]

For years, I've been saying this. I said as soon as he left the Warriors he would never win, and he never did. For years, I've carefully documented his refusal to play TEAM offense and TEAM defense, setting screens, creating diversions. He is one of the worst players I've seen in staying with his man, routinely breaking the defense (note: casuals don't see this because they're ball-watching; someone else's man will score but it's because Durant routinely plays off his man, who receives the ball, Durant's teammate scrambles to guard, now his man is open and the opposing team scores).

I'm not going to repeat the full spiel because people have heard it before. I have nothing against the guy, seems like a good guy off the court and amazing ISO player. His ISO is the focus of casuals including sports journalists and hence his perception as the kind of player who can carry a team to a championship - which he is isn't, has never been.


https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/kevin-durant-reportedly-frustrated-with-suns-underwhelming-supporting-cast/

Durant is now complaining about his supporting cast. No "supporting" cast can carry him to a championship except one that is already capable of winning a championship without him.

I'm no Booker fan, but I can't help but notice Durant doing the same things on the Warriors that ensured the Warriors had a better record when Durant was injured than when he was playing (both reg and post season). Loafing when he doesn't have the ball, making Booker and team go 4 on 5. Refusing to move the ball and facilitate in intelligent ways. Conserving energy on defense and helping the Suns drop in defense.

The year before Durant joined - the Suns were the 3rd best team in defense
https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/defense?Season=2021-22&dir=A&sort=DEF_RATING

This year they are in the bottom half- 18th overall of 30:
https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/defense?Season=2023-24

The standard excuse-makers will claim "oh no it's about Ayton" or someone they usually criticize but now think the Suns owe their defense to or whatever. The problem is the SAME thing happened to the Warriors who were the best team in defense before Durant and dropped after he joined. (Even if it owes to Mikal Bridges, the Suns were more competitive with that crew than the one they have today; calling into question the trade.)

All those who were claiming the Nets would win with him or the Suns would be a great team with him are eating crow. Ultimately empty talk is cheap. I predicted accurately what would happen and years afterwards, it's the case. Durant will keep exciting the casuals with his flashy ISO play and keep losing. Fine for him as he will keep earning the $$ because ultimately flash does win fan interest and loyalty. But if he's on your team and you can't win the ring without him, you will not win one with him on the team.

[SATAN]

Should have tried to make it work with GSW imo. Imagine if he just stayed there longer. He was kind of a laughing stock for a while but if he stuck it out people would have remembered him as a beast of a player that was important in the best team ever constructed...Rather than the weird guy who tried to follow a certain other superstar's methods yet went completely overboard and then failed in his leadership attempts elsewhere.

Imagine if the past couple seasons they still have KD instead of Klay.

[90sgoat]

He is simply in the wrong situation.

It's not a coincidence he teamed up with Harden and Kyrie.

He simply is a primadonna superstar scorer and that's it. You need him on a team like Boston. Swap him for Tatum and they probably win it all.

[Real Men Wear Green]

He keeps trying to engineer a team where he can win. His problem is his own value, any team that trades for him has to give up major assets to get him and the team is left without any depth. The possible lessonis that when you have a smart front office (which they had in OKC) let them design the team around you because if you are forcing trades you are forcing holes in the roster. And yes I know that the Warriors got it done with him I am more soaking in general.

The best thing he can do at this point is just wait it out and hope for Beal to get healthy. If he forces a deal to another team who knows what that team will have to give up for him? Who could even make it work the way he wants that doesn't already have a great situation that works be willing to blow out up for him? Because Phoenix is going to want allstar talent back in some form.

[Kblaze8855]

Predicting people aren’t going to win and then taking a victory Lap has been the easiest thing to do to look smart in virtually every major team sport. Unless you’re in a big fish in a small pond situation like some domestic soccer leagues pretty much everybody great is going to lose, outside of the perfect situation. And even in the perfect situation, there will be too many other people in a perfect situation and losing is inevitable. You throw in injuries, teammates, and coaching? Everybody who plays is going to mostly lose. It’s incredibly difficult to win in multiple situations, which is why so few people do it , despite most legends moving around a bit after free agency really became free and easy.

General team turmoil, injury, and covid restrictions took apart three years after he missed the first. He played 8 games on the Suns last year before the playoffs.

better players than Kevin Durant won’t generally land on a team, barely play, then lead it to a title.

How many games has the team they put together played this season? 2?

Injury, covid restrictions and Kyrie in general, Harden in general….

Its not as simple as it’s being made out to be.

Winning is a delicate balance. Pretty much everybody we have seen win we have seen lose early or miss the playoffs with a similar group around them.

These days teams are plug and play while also doing load management. These teams barely develop.

Leonard is one more twisted ankle or swollen knee from people saying he was carried by the spurs system.

None of these results mean as much as we wanna make them out. we just can’t stop using them because it’s so funny to see people who insisted the results matter when their favorite players win come up with every excuse in the world when people they hate on win. It’s one of the best moments of justified trolling and people aren’t gonna give it up easy. But in truth…winning is just barely shy of random.

You just get a team that is generally capable of it and hope 15 things that can go wrong and ruin it don’t happen this year.

[hold this L]

He is simply in the wrong situation.

It's not a coincidence he teamed up with Harden and Kyrie.

He simply is a primadonna superstar scorer and that's it. You need him on a team like Boston. Swap him for Tatum and they probably win it all.

That can be applied for any superstar lol.. Swap superstar for a non-superstar in the 2nd best team in the league and you get a championship. Bold take.

[90sgoat]

That can be applied for any superstar lol.. Swap superstar for a non-superstar in the 2nd best team in the league and you get a championship. Bold take.

Tatum isn't a true superstar, that's the difference.

[ArbitraryWater]

Not even close, really.


Dude is a bich out there

[LeGoat4Life]

Imagine Durant wasn’t so soft and got his feeling hurt over social media

He would still be on the warriors winning his 6-7 ring

[r0drig0lac]

yep, a stacked team

[bdonovan]

Should have tried to make it work with GSW imo. Imagine if he just stayed there longer. He was kind of a laughing stock for a while but if he stuck it out people would have remembered him as a beast of a player that was important in the best team ever constructed...Rather than the weird guy who tried to follow a certain other superstar's methods yet went completely overboard and then failed in his leadership attempts elsewhere.

Imagine if the past couple seasons they still have KD instead of Klay.

He should have, but he could not handle Warrior's fans considering Steph the best player.

He thought: i won finals mvp, i score the most points.

But Warriors fans understand the 'team' element of the game the way old Spurs fans did because it's how our team plays.

[bdonovan]

He is simply in the wrong situation.

It's not a coincidence he teamed up with Harden and Kyrie.

He simply is a primadonna superstar scorer and that's it. You need him on a team like Boston. Swap him for Tatum and they probably win it all.

Agreed. He can help a team that is already strong in the key areas (team/individual defense, team offense) but could benefit from a guy who can score if you give him the ball. Esp post-season.

[PejaTheSerbSnip]

I’ve said it before: it’s curious how uninspiring the guys career arc has been. He’s the most uninspiring all-time great I’ve ever seen aside from maybe Karl Malone.

Durant’s whole shtick is that he “only cares about hooping”, which beyond being disingenuous (burners, team-hopping, teenage girl-level insecurity reveal otherwise) is achieving resonance, but not in the way he hopped for: the only thing people speak positively of are his pure skills as a basketball player.

Not how he is as a teammate. Not how he contributes to winning. Not as a pillar of a community. Not as an entertainer or candid interview subject (he’s dull and pouty ). The man is a basketball vagabond. No teams fanbase remembers him particularly fondly, both of his titles are hand-waved, much of his prime was lost to injury…just nothing cool about him or his career apart from having great skill variety and being 6’10, allowing the “Ball Don’t Stop”-tier fart-huffers that position themselves as “purists” to feel important by mentioning all of this first-order stuff and then drawing insanely disjointed, non sequitur conclusions from it.

[tpols]

Durant was probably a half inch of a tippy toe away from winning a ring in 2021 given the Bucks were much tougher than an injured Hawks team and choking Suns squad. And that was without his 2nd and 3rd options basically.

The Nets destroyed the Celtics who would go on to make the Finals and barely lose in the very next year when Harden, Kyrie, and Durant were healthy.

The Thunder were a miracle sequence away from beating the 2016 GOAT 73 win warriors and probably winning the ring after that. Assuming Steven Adams doesn't get hurt and Ibaka doesn't get suspended.

Durant has provided good impact. The Suns just have horrible depth and their best 3 players have played like 1 game together while out of the 3, with KD being by far the oldest, Durant still has played the most games.

There's not much he can do about these circumstances if his best teammates literally don't play and the role players are trash.

[ShawkFactory]

Durant was probably a half inch of a tippy toe away from winning a ring in 2021 given the Bucks were much tougher than an injured Hawks team and choking Suns squad. And that was without his 2nd and 3rd options basically.

The Nets destroyed the Celtics who would go on to make the Finals and barely lose in the very next year when Harden, Kyrie, and Durant were healthy.

The Thunder were a miracle sequence away from beating the 2016 GOAT 73 win warriors and probably winning the ring after that. Assuming Steven Adams doesn't get hurt and Ibaka doesn't get suspended.

Durant has provided good impact. The Suns just have horrible depth and their best 3 players have played like 1 game together while out of the 3, with KD being by far the oldest, Durant still has played the most games.

There's not much he can do about these circumstances if his best teammates literally don't play and the role players are trash.

Nah. Assuming that both Harden and Kyrie are out, there's no way the Nets beat the suns.

[Real Men Wear Green]

The Nets destroyed the Celtics who would go on to make the Finals and barely lose in the very next year when Harden, Kyrie, and Durant were healthy Are you really unaware of how completely different the Celtics were from one year to the next? The Celtics team that they beat, the whole offense was Jayson Tatum. Brown was out with a season ending injury, Robert Williams averaged 19 minutes, Al Horford was in Oklahoma. They were just trying to figure out how to play without Kemba Walker. That Celtic team needed 50 from Tatum in the play in just to make the playoffs and then could only win the one game where Tatum' went off just to avoid the embarrassment of a sweep. They don't compare to the EC champ team at all.

[90sgoat]

Agreed. He can help a team that is already strong in the key areas (team/individual defense, team offense) but could benefit from a guy who can score if you give him the ball. Esp post-season.

He is basically Adrian Dantley for the Bad Boys.

[ArbitraryWater]

Durant was probably a half inch of a tippy toe away from winning a ring in 2021 given the Bucks were much tougher than an injured Hawks team and choking Suns squad. And that was without his 2nd and 3rd options basically.

The Nets destroyed the Celtics who would go on to make the Finals and barely lose in the very next year when Harden, Kyrie, and Durant were healthy.

The Thunder were a miracle sequence away from beating the 2016 GOAT 73 win warriors and probably winning the ring after that. Assuming Steven Adams doesn't get hurt and Ibaka doesn't get suspended.

Durant has provided good impact. The Suns just have horrible depth and their best 3 players have played like 1 game together while out of the 3, with KD being by far the oldest, Durant still has played the most games.

There's not much he can do about these circumstances if his best teammates literally don't play and the role players are trash.


What an amazing achievement.


Regardless, hed obv have not win it without Kyrie. Harden was not basketball ready yet.


That miracle sequence the Thunder were away from winning was Kevin Durant going 1/7 in the 4th quarter of their close-out game while entering with an 8 point lead + 2 turnovers in the last 3 minutes


Can you say choke?


Guy only thrived in GS safe space with the huge range for error

[ArbitraryWater]

So many other players would galvanize this Suns team or get something going...

but this lackadasical mfer is just strolling out there, being passive, fishing for calls and complaining...

and of course its just his role players being trash.

This dude had Book playing at peak MJ levels last year and only started contributing to games when they were out of reach (Nuggets series).

Would have gotten sonned badly by Kawhi had Kawhi not gone down too. 2017 game 1 & rest of series replay all over.

[ILLsmak]

Durant is a cold blooded assassin. He brings something that is unique to the floor. It's just a matter of having the team around him. It's not superstar teammates that he needs, that's the funny part. Curry is a superstar, but their team is built like A TEAM. He needed a legit team. He got done having to start his career alongside WB.

I'm not a fan of his personality, but dude is one of the most amazing talents I've ever seen, since college. Nothing is standing in the way of him winning except for not having the right team. Unfort, in this era, it's big. But he already won and got FMVPs, and was on THE BEST TEAM at least since late 90s bulls and probably longer.

PUT RESPEK ON HIM. But yeah he is kinda a weirdo. His bball skill is something else. Bron is a weirdo, too.

-Smak

[Manny98]

Y'all just realizing that now :lol

[SATAN]

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/image.php?u=398555&dateline=1703583364

[ArbitraryWater]

Durant is a cold blooded assassin. He brings something that is unique to the floor. It's just a matter of having the team around him. It's not superstar teammates that he needs, that's the funny part. Curry is a superstar, but their team is built like A TEAM. He needed a legit team. He got done having to start his career alongside WB.

I'm not a fan of his personality, but dude is one of the most amazing talents I've ever seen, since college. Nothing is standing in the way of him winning except for not having the right team. Unfort, in this era, it's big. But he already won and got FMVPs, and was on THE BEST TEAM at least since late 90s bulls and probably longer.

PUT RESPEK ON HIM. But yeah he is kinda a weirdo. His bball skill is something else. Bron is a weirdo, too.

-Smak


Man what is this bullshit :lol

[ILLsmak]

Man what is this bullshit :lol

Ay you were mad back when KD put that pull up 3 on Bron. Haha. We gotta pull up those old threads were you were saying KD wasn't clutch or whatever.

I REMEMBER.

YAWL HATIN.

-Smak

[tontoz]

KD misses Steph for obvious reasons.

https://hosting.photobucket.com/images/g195/tontoz/(edited)_Screenshot_20220701-162940.png

[kawhileonard2]

Oh

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/showthread.php?489748-When-KD-and-Lebron-go-head-to-head

[Druckenmiller]

His entire basketball career can be summed up with the phrase, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”

He’s a high maintenance house wife.

[beau_boy04]

hahaha :roll: this Durant poor guy hahaha. can't stop laughing at him. Will possibly never win another title.

[WhiteKyrie]

He easily couldn’t won in 2021. No Kyrie or Harden and his long ass foot happened to be on the three point line

[fsvr54]

He easily couldn’t won in 2021. No Kyrie or Harden and his long ass foot happened to be on the three point line

If we're playing what-ifs then Durant wouldn't have won if Kawhi didn't tear his ACL.