Kevin Durant could end a lot of speculation and eliminate a potential distraction by coming out and committing to the Golden State Warriors for next season and beyond, but he has continuously passed up the opportunity to do that. Why? Perhaps because he is genuinely unsure of what he is going to do.
Marc J. Spears of The Undefeated was the latest to ask Durant about his future beyond this season, and the two-time NBA Finals MVP gave the same response — he doesn’t know, and he wants fans to stop talking about it.
“Yo, just watch the game. Just focus on the game and stop nitpicking, because it is a beautiful game going on out there,” Durant said following Golden State’s playoff win over the Los Angeles Clippers on Saturday. “What can I do right now? I can’t sign a paper. I got to do the most important thing, and that is play. And that is what we should be focusing on.”
Again, Durant could give a verbal commitment. While he argues that announcing a decision now would “take away from the team” and what they are trying to accomplish, that is a convenient way of avoiding the question. Durant could have said earlier in the year that he isn’t going anywhere, but he chose not to. Though, he is simply telling the truth if he’s truly undecided.
“It is not necessary for me to make a decision right now. It would be bad to do that. It would take the focus off of what is important,” Durant added. “I would never want to put my teammates in a messed-up position. I want to forget about it.
“But it is still putting everybody in messed-up positions where everybody wants to know all the time, everybody is speculating and everybody is trying to get in my head and what I think about it.”
In fairness to Durant, Kyrie Irving said before the season that he intends to re-sign with the Boston Celtics this summer, and that has not stopped his impending free agency from becoming a major topic of discussion. Of course, the feud Durant had with Draymond Green early in the season has added more intrigue to his situation.
The Warriors are trying to win their third consecutive championship with Durant, and it seems like a real possibility that he could move on to something else when the latest run is finished. The fact that he won’t say one way or the other only makes fans talk more.
