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Kevin Durant's trade demand and ultimatum to the Brooklyn Nets ended in vain, and for an NBA executive, the superstar forward has no one to blame but himself.
When Durant asked out of Brooklyn, it looked like there was no way back for him. He even told Nets owner Joe Tsai to choose between him or Steve Nash and Sean Marks if they really want him back–basically burning all bridges that could eventually convince him to stay. … or so we thought. In the end, with no appealing trade offers coming for him, Durant had no other choice but to re-commit to the team.
It is definitely a big win for the Nets, who stood ground and didn't give in to Durant's demands. In contrast, it's a massive L for KD who probably thought he's not going back considering the moves he made.
In a report by Steve Bulpett of Heavy.com, an anonymous league executive pointed out that Durant's biggest mistake was not how he handled the situation, but rather the deal he took. Instead of copying LeBron James' style of doing shorter deals, he signed a long-term contract straight on. That took away all his leverage in making demands to the team.
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“The guy who miscalculated was Kevin Durant, because he took that four-year deal,” the exec explained. “He didn’t take a page out of LeBron’s book and take a shorter-term deal. LeBron’s bet on himself, and that’s kept him in a leverage position with his team. With all his teams really.
“You can put on pressure when you have an opt-out coming up soon, but it’s a lot harder to scare your team when that team is sitting there holding your signed four-year contract.”
That certainly makes sense. Throughout the KD trade saga, the reason the Nets were able to stay firm on their stance was the fact that Kevin Durant is under contract for four more years.
Perhaps things would have ended up differently had Durant been on a shorter deal. Sure enough, the likelihood of the Nets scouring for deals to get the best return from him would be higher.
Thinking about it is useless now, though. Hopefully for KD, the decision to resume his partnership with Brooklyn would result to an NBA title. After all, that is the only way everyone would forget the offseason disaster they just had.
