Kyrie Irving has come scorching out of the gate after signing with the Brooklyn Nets along with his good friends DeAndre Jordan and Kevin Durant – the latter of whom will likely miss all of the 2019-20 season after rupturing his Achilles’ tendon.
Despite no Durant, as well as a lackluster defense leading to a 2-3 record in the Eastern Conference, Irving is obliterating teams on his way to 32.6 points per game, 7.0 assists per game and 5.6 rebounds per game to start the season.
Even though his numbers have been striking, the news about Irving is, once again, more focused on his off-the-court behavior related to his reported “mood swings” and “funks.”
While those two things sound like they are par for the course for being a part of the human race, that is the narrative that some elements of the media have run with, and Irving spoke to Joe Vardon of The Athletic to provide some context into his leadership style and how his feelings may or may not affect that:
“True leadership comes from the way your actions speak … It’s just not trying to overemphasize what leadership means all the time and overexplain it, in terms of, ‘This is me as a leader.’ Because truth be told, there is not just one leader in the locker room,” Irving told Vardon.
Vardon pressed Irving on how his past experiences with leadership in Boston has affected him this year:
“I think it’s just the realization that I’m going to be one of the leaders, regardless (of) whether I want to come out and say it or not,” said Irving.
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