Kevin Durant On Media’s Horrible Treatment of Kobe Bryant After Retirement Announcement

Oklahoma City Thunder star Kevin Durant vehemently decried the media’s harsh words following Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant’s announcement on Sunday that he would be retiring at the end of this season. The two players forged a special relationship after playing together on the 2012 Olympic US Men’s national team. Durant even called Kobe “the greatest of all time” about a year and a half ago, and even compared him to Michael Jordan.

When asked about his thoughts on Bryant’s impending retirement, Durant’s full comment was this:

“I did idolize Kobe Bryant. I studied him, wanted to be like him. He was our Michael Jordan. I watched Michael toward the end of his career with the Wizards and I seen that’s what Kobe emerged as the guy for us. I’ve been disappointed this year because you guys (media) treated him like s***. He’s a legend and all I hear is about how bad he’s playing, how bad he’s shooting, time for him to hang it up. You guys treated one of our legends like s*** and I didn’t really like it. Hopefully now you can start being nice to him now that he decided to retire after this year. It was sad the way he was getting treated. He had just an amazing career, a guy who changed the game for me as a player mentally and physically. Means so much to the game of basketball. Someone I’m always gonna look to advice for anything. Just a brilliant, brilliant, intelligent man. Sad to see him go. He put his mark on the game.”

Durant was then heavily criticized in return by the media, who thought his sweeping generalizations were outlandish, and Durant retaliated by concluding: “They say I don’t get the media and how they work. Well, they never got players and how we work.”

Kobe had indeed been struggling this past season to maintain good numbers: He was missing 70 percent of his field goal attempts and 80 percent of his three-pointers, and took many more shots than his teammates.