Kyrie Irving declines to speak with media and instead releases bizarre statement
Why is Nets star Kyrie Irving declining to speak with the media in the offseason?
Ahead of the most exciting year of Brooklyn Nets basketball in the history of the franchise, of course there has to be some sort of hoopla surrounding Kyrie Irving. Fans had to have expected this the second he left Boston for New York City.
After just a year with the team, Irving’s mostly been shrouded with controversy, which, objectively speaking, is par for the course based on the stories/reports that have followed him throughout his career. Is it possible he’s unfairly targeted? Sure. But there’s always something, and it’s hard not to have most of that attributed to the person who’s constantly the subject of such attention.
Now, whether you view this as a positive development or not, it’s bringing some sort of attention to the Nets the team perhaps would rather not have. Irving declined to speak with the media on Friday (skipping NBA’s media week) and instead released this statement through a spokesperson.
Kyrie Irving issued a statement that says, in part: “My goal this season is to let my work on and off the court speak for itself.”
— Malika Andrews (@malika_andrews) December 4, 2020
He said he is issuing this statement instead of speaking with reporters. pic.twitter.com/ninUzAnhzC
The man is not wrong. Everything he said in there rings true and there’s no reason not to support those encouraging words. However, why is he not speaking with the media? Doesn’t a veteran of his stature understand at this point in his career that such a move is typically viewed unfavorably?
We’re not knocking Irving whatsoever. We hope his actions speak for themselves in a way that influences everyone for the better and makes him feel at ease. But why not just hop on a call and say that yourself?
Fellow star Kevin Durant has already spoken with the media at length and we know the kind of difficult questions he’s tasked with answering every time he exposes himself. We already saw that in the form of the James Harden trade rumors. Try being ANY member of the Philadelphia 76ers right now. Irving hardly has it bad compared to many others.
The receipts on Kyrie don’t exactly support him, either. Remember the trade controversy in Cleveland that he eventually apologized to LeBron James for? That ended up being true. How about last year before the pandemic happened when he threw his Nets teammates under the bus after losing a game?
And while there’s a lot of admiration for his stance against the NBA bubble, the fallout in which he appeared to be the lone dissenter among the rest of the league’s superstars and reportedly “relished in the clash” was further evidence that even when he has the right intentions, there’s always something that disrupts his messaging, forcing it to be viewed unfavorably.
Who knows, maybe that’ll change with his actions on and off the court this year. Those’ll speak louder than words, for sure. But this latest action does speak a bit louder than his statement, if we’re being honest.
