Kevin Durant is one of the best basketball players on the planet, so when he signed with the mighty Golden State Warriors, the NBA’s other 29 teams obviously weren’t too happy.
But the Boston Celtics apparently were the most peeved, and Jae Crowder isn’t shy about vocalizing it.
Crowder was part of the Celtics’ contingent that met with Durant in the Hamptons, and he told MassLive.com’s Tom Westerholm on Wednesday that he left the meeting thinking KD would come to the Celtics if he didn’t stay with the Oklahoma City Thunder.
But when Durant chose the Warriors, well, that really set Crowder off.
“We were the only team in the NBA to beat both (the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State) on their home court — the only team in the NBA, the Boston Celtics,” Crowder said. “We told him that. We played him clips from both games and told him basically the scouting report of how we guarded Steph (Curry) and Klay (Thompson) — our entire game plan, basically.
“That’s what made me mad. We (expletive) told him everything we do to beat these guys, and we beat them, and he went and joined them. … I felt like afterward, I was talking to (Celtics point guard) Isaiah (Thomas), like maybe after you sit back, you shouldn’t have told him everything, but who the (expletive) thought he was going to Golden State, realistically?
“It was like a slap in the face for us, basically.”
Tell us how you really feel, Jae.
In hindsight, it’s hard to blame Durant for picking the team that won an NBA-record 73 games last season. But that didn’t make Crowder any less mad about the league’s disturbing trend toward superteams.
“(Golden State) is for sure the villain of the league,” Crowder added. “Every other NBA guy, friends of mine, are really disgusted from how the league is turning on that standpoint. Everybody is joining together, everybody wants to go to Golden State or Cleveland.”
Thumbnail photo via Bob DeChiara/USA TODAY Sports Images
