Add former NBA superstar Tracy McGrady to the list of people who were not a fan of Kevin Durant “taking the easy way out” and signing with the 73-win Golden State Warriors. When asked by Complex’s Chris Gaine about his thoughts on Durant signing with the Warriors, McGrady responded:
I was disappointed in the move to Golden State. I wasn’t disappointed that he left, I mean he’s a free agent, he’s able to go wherever he wants. But I just think having a team now coming off a championship run and you have the champs down 3-1, and they come back and defeat you. I just think as a competitor, you would come back and try to dethrone them with the same team.
You’re playing with a top-five point guard in Russell Westbrook. I mean to me, I think OKC is a championship-caliber team. They displayed that; they just had a major collapse in the Western Conference Finals against Golden State. But I was highly disappointed that he chose Golden State to go and play for the other team. I wanted him to stay in OKC.
I get where T-Mac is coming from here. Joining the team that just barely beat you in the playoffs seemingly goes against every competitive instinct. However, Durant has tried and tried with this OKC team, and has, time and time again, fallen just short of winning a championship. Maybe he needs a change of scenery. Maybe he needs to just do whatever it takes to win a championship, so that he doesn’t have to worry about retiring without a ring. If he can just win one championship (or a few championships), then he can play out the remainder of his career however he would like to without that pressure hanging over his head.
McGrady also spoke about his distaste for NBA “superteams:”
They’re awful. I think it’s bad considering they tried to change things in the [collective bargaining agreement] to stop all of the superteams. And with the $93 million salary cap, you’re not going to be able to stop that. Teams have so much money to spend on players, it’s like AAU basketball nowadays in the league. Whereas when I was playing you had a superstar on the Orlando Magic. You had a superstar in Boston in Paul Pierce. You had a superstar in Philadelphia in Allen Iverson. You had a superstar in Toronto in Vince Carter. You had Ray Allen, a superstar in Milwaukee. That made it such a competitive league and the guys I was with, everybody didn’t team up. We were all trying to beat each other’s a**.
