Author Topic: Was Durant signing with the warriors a factor in Kyrie wanting out of Cleveland?  (Read 1000 times)

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Offline perks-a-beast

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Yes or no? Maybe Kyrie knew if he stayed on the cavs they would probably end up against the warriors in the finals for years and be taken to the tool shed. Probably thinking it was better to be the main guy and start fresh elsewhere and wait out the demise of this warriors team.

Offline cman88

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I think he saw the writing on the wall as well. Cavs were lebrons team, and were/are hamstrung with big contracts for ageing veterans. If/when Lebron leaves Kyrie would be stuck on a poorly constructed team with no assets to improve.

He really jumped into the perfect situation with the celtics. Great coach, organization. 2 other all-stars in Horford/Hayward and two young budding stars in jaylen brown/Tatum. He could be out of Lebrons shadow, and at the same time go to a team ready to compete for championships

Offline TheTruth34

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The motivation for Kyrie was LeBron pulling the GM strings in Cleveland.  Word leaked out on the potential deal to Phoenix.  And the source was most likely Lebron's team (Rich Paul and his agency).

After last season's finals loss, LeBron basically said (paraphrasing) that he had no reason to hang his head.  It was a passive aggressive way of throwing his teammates under the bus. I'd guess an alpha like Kyrie didn't take too kindly to these comments.  Aside from that, LeBron being buddy-buddy with Chris Paul probably didn't help matters.     

Offline droopdog7

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Seems as simple as a great player wanting to blaze his own trail.  I get it too.

Offline wdleehi

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I got the impression he no longer wanted to be a prisoner of Lebron's career choices.   He didn't want to be left with "Lebrons vet team" without Lebron.



So he made a "Patriot" move.   Get traded one season earlier before it falls apart. 

Offline gouki88

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I got the impression he no longer wanted to be a prisoner of Lebron's career choices.   He didn't want to be left with "Lebrons vet team" without Lebron.



So he made a "Patriot" move.   Get traded one season earlier before it falls apart.
Yeah, basically how I see it. Can’t imagine KI would like being on a team consisting of Kyrie/JR/Jeff Green/Love/TT
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Offline Phantom255x

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I think that was definitely a factor, along with the Cavaliers seemingly open to shopping him to teams like Phoenix or Indiana for Bledsoe or George. So he decided to demand and force out.

But also, he didn't get as much recognition as he deserved. Forget that Game 7 shot in the 2016 Finals, but even in that Finals series overall, the Cavaliers AREN'T coming back from down 3-1 without Irving's overall contributions/averages as well. Nope, Lebron w/o Kyrie isn't coming back down 3-1. Yet barely anyone talks about it. It's all, "Lebron came back down 3-1, Lebron brought Cleveland a championship, Lebron single-handedly carries Cavaliers to title after falling behind 3-1" and barely any mention of Irving.

Then, when they lose the Finals the year after in 5 games, Lebron indirectly takes a shot at the rest of the team saying they could have done better and he did his best, and the media is like, "oh Kyrie could have done more" even though the guy averaged 29/5/4.
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