Speaking today to reporters at the Nets‘ Media Day, Kyrie Irving said he felt as if he let down his teammates in Boston last season and wants to be a better leader for his new team in Brooklyn.
As Malika Andrews of ESPN.com details, Irving opened up about how the death of his grandfather last fall impacted him and why he had a change of heart following his preseason vow to re-sign with the Celtics and ultimately decided to play closer to home.
“A lot of the joy I had from basketball was sucked away from me,” Irving said of the time following his grandfather’s death. “There was a facial expression I carried around with me throughout the year and I didn’t allow anyone to get close to me. It really bothered me. I didn’t take the necessary steps to get counseling or therapy. I had to acknowledge that fact.”
Irving received much of the blame for the Celtics’ disappointing 2018/19 showing, which included chemistry issues and a leadership void in the locker room. In his comments today, he seemed to acknowledge that the criticism was fair.
“A lot of those battles I thought I could battle through (in Boston’s) team environment, I wasn’t ready for,” Irving said, according to Andrews. “And I failed those guys. I didn’t give them everything I could have during that season. In terms of me being a leader and bringing everyone together, I’ve failed.”
Chris Forsberg of NBC Sports Boston provides a more extensive transcript of Irving’s comments, while Rob Perez passes along a video link. The All-Star point guard said he is arriving in Brooklyn with a “fresh mindset” and hopes to avoid the same mistakes he made with the Celtics.
Here’s more from the Nets’ Media Day:
- Asked about why he chose the Nets in free agency and whether he considered teams like the Warriors, Knicks, and Clippers, Kevin Durant said he thought about those other possibilities for “a couple seconds,” but wanted to be in Brooklyn (Twitter links via Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic). “It was really easy to see what these guys brought to the table,” Durant said of the Nets. “It’s not like I had to do any deep analysis of any player here.”
- Durant also offered the following quote on his decision to leave the Warriors (Twitter link via Adam Zagoria of ZagsBlog): “I felt like it was time for a change and I wanted to play for a new team and simply put I just did it. I didn’t really think about what I was leaving behind. I thought it’s time to think about me.”
- According to Irving, he and Durant would like to finish their careers together with the Nets (video link via Yahoo Sports).
- Irving told reporters about talking to Durant and DeAndre Jordan at “4:16 in the morning” on the day of free agency and deciding they wanted to play together in Brooklyn (video link via Perez).
- Jordan said that he and Jarrett Allen will compete and bring out the best in one another, and that both players will be fine no matter who ends up winning the starting center job (Twitter link via James Herbert of CBS Sports).
I thought free agency doesn’t begin until the evening on the day of the free agency, so isn’t it tampering to talk to other players about teaming up 4:16 in the morning.
The rules don’t prevent players from talking amongst themselves about where they want to play. If Spencer Dinwiddie had also been involved in the conversation and was telling them what the Nets were planning to offer them, that’d be a different story.
So as long as a current member of the team they are talking about teaming up on is not present, then it is fine. Thanks.
Basically. Adam Silver actually addressed this specifically the other day, so maybe it’s better if I just copy + paste what he said:
“If two players are going out to dinner and say, ‘Boy, wouldn’t it be great to play in City X together?’ That’s not something we’re looking to go after. The only context in which we raised player-to-player communication is where we have a belief that a player is being sent out at the behest of the team to have a conversation with another player that the team itself could not have with that player. In essence, where a player is acting as an agent for the team, and then saying to the player, ‘What do you think about the following scenario, with the confidence that this is something that my team is willing to do?'”
But what if a player recruits because he wants to win on his own without getting “behested” by the some FO person?– because that is what happens, more than a “behesting”.
Kind of a rhetorical qustion really; there is nothing the commissioner can do about that either. Such is allowed by both the CBA and the US Constitution and was not bargained away. Indeed GMs are only restricted by their own designs (to restrict other GMs).
Sounds like a great story for the Nets. However, are they really better off today than at the end of last season? Durant is not playing next season. Having, personally had a ruptured Achilles I will bet that Durant is NEVER the same. He will play but you lose explosiveness. So the major upgrade is swapping DLo for Kyrie until next season. Is that really that much better or am I missing something?
You’re not missing a thing here, the Nets aren’t any better now than they were last season. Kyrie didn’t do jack in Boston, nor will he in Brooklyn. And Kevin Durant will never be the same after rupturing his achilles tendon, just look at Boogie Cousins.
The fact that KD got a max means he will at least be back to all star form. I believe teams have medical information in players they are signing. IT and Cousins were never the same players that’s why they min deals.
And then after the media left they gave thanks for the blessings upon their lands then gorged on the finest of meats and cheeses then partook some of the sparkling wine that await the fruits of their labors and dozed off dreaming of fair titles and getting lucky in general at least by June the next.
Kyrie literally broke his cheekbone hours after proclaiming how much of a leader he will be this year. The king of foot in mouth strikes again!
I wonder how long before Kyrie and KD alienate the locker room
Surprised this article doesn’t include the other set of Kyrie comments that are much dumber, where he says that some evil people caused Durant to injure himself.
You mean the medics who could not even locate the injury?
Irving is no genius though, I wish he would stop with the leadership malarkey.
As a Celtics fan that can 100% tell you Kyrie let down his teammates last year… I am actually pretty glad to see him finally admit it. Not that it really fixes/excuses how things went. But all along he’s acted as if he did nothing wrong and he was just some misunderstood hero… I’m sorry for his situation with his grandfather and hope he does get things figured out mentally going forward because he sure was a cancer on the C’s last season whether that was the real cause or not.