{"id":35827,"date":"2022-06-04T01:02:08","date_gmt":"2022-06-04T01:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/kevin-durant-says-stephen-a-smith-and-others-ruined-the-nba\/"},"modified":"2022-06-04T01:02:08","modified_gmt":"2022-06-04T01:02:08","slug":"kevin-durant-says-stephen-a-smith-and-others-ruined-the-nba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/kevin-durant-says-stephen-a-smith-and-others-ruined-the-nba\/","title":{"rendered":"Kevin Durant says Stephen A. Smith and others ruined the NBA"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The war between Brooklyn Nets star Kevin Durant and the NBA media continued this week in a series of tweets stemming from, of course, something Stephen A. Smith said on ESPN’s “First Take.”<\/p>\n

Durant took offense when Smith said Michael Jordan changed the game of basketball for the worse because of how he “individualization the sport.” Smith argued the NBA focused more on players rather than teams after Jordan’s ascension which negatively changed the dynamic of the game.<\/p>\n

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“Michael Jordan is responsible as much as anybody for changing the game for worse,” Smith said<\/a>. “He was so phenominal that the NBA marketed the individual, the audience gravitated towards the individual and the game became a bit more individualized. … What I’m saying is you were thinking ‘team’ until Jordan elevated it to another level. And from Jordan then you had the Kobes and the Vince Carters and others that came along thereafter and the individualization of the sport – particularly because of the money that came with it – became more of a focal point.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

Durant refuted that idea and instead suggested in a tweet on Thursday that media personalities like Smith, Skip Bayless and Shannon Sharpe actually changed the game for the worse. Not the players.<\/p>\n

That ignited a series of reply tweets from other fans and journalists. The first being, of course, Smith himself. The ESPN analyst played the “we are legion” card by claiming there are “thousands more” media personalities like himself who are “not going away.”<\/p>\n

Eddie Johnson, a color analyst for the Phoenix Suns, disagreed<\/a> with Smith’s argument but responded to Durant’s tweet by calling today’s athletes “too dam (sic) sensitive.” To that Durant responded that media members are actually the ones who are too sensitive and “can’t take what ya’ll dish out.”<\/p>\n

Durant versus the media<\/h2>\n

This isn’t the first time Durant clashed with the media. His social media fights di lui have been the stuff of legend online, and he’s gone after just about everyone – fans and journalists alike.<\/p>\n