The Warriors Should Be Worried About Kevin Durant

On July 5th, Kevin Durant announced that he would be forsaking the city and team where he grew from a bone-skinny 20 year old to an All-NBA, perennial-MVP-candidate man for the bright lights of California’s Bay Area. At the time, the decision was framed as an almost-unfair addition to the NBA’s imbalance of power, decimating the Golden State Warriors’ chief Western Conference rival while adding the league’s most dynamic scorer to a team that had already posted the greatest regular season record of all time. The rest of the league’s contenders, it was said, should be worried.

Now, just over a month later, it looks like maybe it’s the Warriors who should be worried.

With Team USA expected, as usual, to dominate this summer’s Olympics, many expected the most interesting basketball storyline to be the first glimpses of how Durant would mesh with a team filled with stars, specifically Warriors teammates Draymond Green and Klay Thompson. The answer, it seems, is badly.

At first glance, this seems surprising. Given the way he shamefully ceded alpha-dog status to teammate Russell Westbrook in Oklahoma City, and the way he collapsed after their Thunder lead the Warriors 3–1 in the 2015–16 Western Conference Finals, you would expect Durant to enjoy a situation where he can skate by on the talent surrounding him, allowing others to do the dirty work for him and escaping the pressure that comes with being one of the only stars, not just on his team but in his entire state. He’s always been a super efficient scorer, even in an ISO-heavy offense with a heavy workload; conventional wisdom would suggest that when he’s allowed to be more selective, he’d become even more efficient. Durant’s inability to thrive when surrounded by elite talent bodes poorly for Golden State’s chances of getting back to the top of the NBA’s mountain.

In a game where the United States barely scraped by the Boomers of Australia, Durant came up small, committing twice as many turnovers as he had assists, missing 11 of his 15 shots for just 12 points, and, with just one dime, failing to even put his teammates in position to succeed. Australia’s best players are Andrew Bogut and Patty Mills; the Cavs have LeBron James and Kyrie Irving, and the Warriors won’t have Olympic Carmelo Anthony™ to bail Durant out. The fact that Thompson is playing so poorly on a team with Durant should have the Dubs doubly concerned.

This sort of failure may seem surprising, but it’s not. Durant spent years in a media bubble in Oklahoma City. As LeBron James formed a super team with the Heat, Durant was held up as the yin to his yang, quiet, humble, and unselfish. He faced criticism just once during that time, when the Oklahoman referred to him in a bold headline as MR. UNRELIABLE. The paper later rescinded and apologized for the headline; Durant’s bubble remained unbroken, and he grew bolder. With no criticism about him to be upset about, Durant chose to go out of his way to be hurt by what the media said about others. At All-Star Weekend in 2015, Durant told the media they “[didn’t] know shit” in response to their questions about future fired-coach Scott Brooks. When Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban suggested Westbrook might not be a superstar, Durant reacted just as petulantly, cutting Westbrook off to call Cuban an idiot.

Now, in the wake of his decision to take the easy way to a title in Golden State, Durant is facing actual scrutiny for the first time ever, and he’s crumbling in its face. Durant is too sensitive to play the villain role he’s been cast in, and no matter how much he pretends to not care what people think or say about him, it’s painfully obvious just from hearing him talk that he does. At nearly 28 years old, Durant may be too far along in his professional development to incorporate Not Shrinking Like A High School Freshman Having to Speak In Front of the Entire School When the Media Is Mean to Him into his otherwise impressive skill set.

If the constant, sun-through-a-magnifying-glass-like media focus on James’ Heat is anything like what the Warriors can expect, if Durant can’t learn to cope, the Warriors season will be over before it begins. Golden State fans have to hope the only other plausible explanation for Durant’s poor play is what’s really to blame: that he simply hates America and everything it stands for. After his decision to join the NBA’s 1%, would you be surprised?