The NBA’s Kevin Durant Problem (or, it’s OK to Sportshate)

Kevin Durant’s decision to spurn Oklahoma City this week and return to the Bay Area will have repercussions for years to come. There is no shortage of hot takes of outrage, no shortage of disappointment, and no shortage of sanctimonious culture warriors (no pun intended) telling people that their emotional aversion to Durant’s exodus is ridiculous. Don’t worry. It’s perfectly natural to (sports)hate Kevin Durant for leaving the Thunder. In fact, it’s healthy.

All these condescending sportswriters, Twitterers, and friends are telling us Kevin Durant’s exodus is just like you or I switching jobs. Here’s Deadspin’s Barry Petchesky.

Dude’s just an employee making an employment decision. Here’s a fun thought experiment: When you read analysis of the move today, mentally replace “play” with “work” and “team” with “workplace.” Durant, though on a much more public pedestal, is making the same employment decisions we make—and are encouraged to make—all the time.

Here’s an even more hyperbolic take by SportsOnEarth’s Will Lietch.

He did what Wall Streeters do, what day laborers do, what writers do, what politicians do, what nurses do, what freelancers do, what every single one of us does, or at least tries to do. He recognized his value on the open market and made certain that he was able not only to have the utmost control over his situation, but also make the decision that was specific to him, the one that did well for him financially, personally, emotionally. It is, on this Independence Day, the American dream. A human, through hard work, talent and dedication, using the spoils of his labor to declare his freedom to do what he wishes and be compensated handsomely for it. Outside the world of sports, we would all cheer this.

Lietch goes on to deride Durant critics who’ve called Kevin “selfish,” “a front-runner,” “greedy,” “disdainful of Oklahoma City,” “weak,” and “a heel.” Myself, I called KD a coward and a traitor. Lietch and everyone who compares Durant to the average Joe is completely missing the point that sports is not “real life.” The entire reason these guys make so much money is because of the passion of fans. Anyone who plays, follows, and/or coaches sports knows that teams, their players, and their fans coalesce into a tribal identity, and that tribal identity is the passion which fuels viewership, ticket sales, merchandising, etc. If one moves from one tribe to another, especially the tribe that just beat you, it’s considered a betrayal and an act of cowardice. Heck. Look at how Cavs fans booed Andy, and he didn’t leave by choice.

Sportswriters are trying to get us to decry our basic, tribal instincts and to look at the bigger picture. But it’s cynical for people who make their living writing about the NBA to say that its consumers are suckered by tribalism and the marketing of the NBA – marketing based on competition and rivalry, and funded by fan passion. To, on one hand, enjoy the money generated by that zeal, and then, on the other hand, expect there to be no consequences when Durant and other turncoats disappoint fans, organizations, and teammates, and spurn the time, emotion, and money they have invested is either of naive or malevolent hypocrisy.

There is nothing wrong with caring about basketball, and nothing wrong with a little sports hate. I hated the Raiders in the 90s. I hated the Spurs of nine years ago. I hated the Heat. I hated the Zombie Sonics. I hated the Warriors. I HATED LeBron cause he broke my heart and crapped on where I live (and has since made amends – clearly).

But “Sports hate” isn’t real. And, while people can argue whether sports is a sucker’s game and an opiate for the masses, It can be a healthy, cathartic outlet for projecting your real life frustrations onto a sports villain or heel. You can turn it off when it’s over and go back to your life. It’s true that some people certainly lose the ability to draw the line between sports hate and actual destructive behavior, and someone needs to help those fans put things into perspective. But there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to see a professional athlete fail on the court, the field, the golf course, etc. and then putting on your shirt and forgetting about it when you go to work on Monday.

The money made off folks rooting against professional athletes spends just as well as the money made off folks rooting for professional athletes – and we should laugh in the face of any sports writer who feels compelled to tell large swaths of the population how to feel about anything.

There are “real life” comparisons. I’d consider it a dishonorable act for someone to go to a competitor, all things being equal. It’s certainly not a choice I’d make, and I’d consider it a betrayal if a co-worker did it. It’s a free country, but and the fact that Durant is taking less money to go to Golden State has got to burn his teammates. And, the fact that Draymond Green was by many accounts

KD’s WCF Game 6 4th Q. shot chart via ESPN.com

“actively recruiting” Durant throughout the season seems like a very bad continuing trend for the NBA.

In many respects, I get why Durant did this. I don’t know if Russell Westbrook will ever win anything. He can be so brilliant at times, and then he can piss away games like he did Game Six. And, Billy Donovan didn’t figure out how to coach till the playoffs. And, the Thunder did trade James Harden…

But going to the team that just beat you invites all sorts of horrific implications. Do these players actually care about the cities they work in? About their teammates? Was Durant “really trying” when his team blew a 3-1 lead versus Golden State?

Check out his fourth quarter shot chart in the pivotal Game Six. Was he tanking? I don’t really think so, as it was Russell Westbrook’s litany of terrible decisions more than Durant’s poor play that led to that late game breakdown (and maybe is part of why KD rolled on out), but the perception that Kevin could have been tanking in a league where half the league goes in the tank by season’s end is an enormous problem.

These critics of fan passion also like to say things like, “if you’re not an OKC fan you shouldn’t boo KD.” And, “the city that stole the Sonics got what they deserved.” I empathize with the people of OKC. I have family and friends who live there. And, I’ve felt what it’s like to have someone leave that I invested a lot into. (LeBron, 2010). Believe me, I don’t love how the Thunder ended up in OKC. I called them the Tacoma City Plunder for years. But, I’m not a heartless jerk who can’t empathize with the folks who didn’t have anything to do with how the city got its team.

Further, there’s a real frustration among fans who have a sense that the rules of fair-play are being violated here. A long time NBA fan I know recently referred to the association as “a joke” because there are “now two teams (maybe three, maybe one) now capable of winning a title. The rest are mulling about & increasingly all about cashing checks.” He has a completely fair point. If the NBA folded tomorrow, and the players made a completely new league, they’d have to distribute the players as evenly as they could to create a league that could be marketed in every city in which it played. Part of football’s enormous popularity is due to its competitive balance. Everyone feels like they have a shot (and the huge rosters help smooth the talent disparity – outside of the QB position).

But this Warriors’ team seems like a stacked deck that is almost impossible to compete against: a four all-star team that just added a top five NBA player and another former all-star in David West. The competitive balance has shifted so far towards them that it reminds one of those historically dominant Yankee teams or, as Colin McGowan pointed out in his excellent RealGM piece, the soccer power houses of Europe.

A season that was set to be fun and fraught is now just shy of a coronation. Durant hasn’t done anything wrong, per se, and he’s created something we’ve never seen before, but the novelty of it will only carry us so far. Is this really going to be so wonderful to watch?

A reason why Average Joe Fan gets so irritated when players are signing exorbitant checks is because these team’s fans don’t feel like they have any shot at a decent season. If their team is not in the top 10 or so, they don’t even have a chance to get to the second round of the playoffs. And, if they’re not a playoff team, they’re going to actively stop trying to win games to get a better draft pick. And yeah, most of us don’t have a problem with the players getting paid versus the owners, but it’s not easy for everyone to see players hitting the lottery when they don’t seem to have to care or play all that hard, just cash the checks.

The shift towards a Plutocracy in the NBA one of the things that the last labor stoppage was designed to thwart, and KD’s move will likely add to owner’s intransigence in the summer of 2017. The richest billionaires in the world don’t want to compete in a league where they feel only a couple teams have a chance, and to the average fan, it has to feel like what so much of this election season is about: if you’re not in on “the system” you’re locked out of it, and can’t grab the next rung on the ladder.

And that’s the problem with sportshate. Eventually, when you feel like you don’t ever have a chance, you suffer through the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. OKC fans are probably moving on to bargaining, and then will come the malaise, and eventually folks will just check out. The NBA is in trouble if more fans than than just OKC’s get to malaise, and then acceptance – you know, turning off the TV and going outside. I’m sure the players, the NBA, and the sportwriters who depend on it for their living would much rather fans hate Kevin Durant than close up their wallets and turn off the TV.