It's been two months since we last saw Kevin Durant on an NBA court, yet he continues to steal most of the headlines.
The Brooklyn Nets superstar wants a fresh start somewhere else. He shocked the world by requesting a trade with four years left in his contract, a nearly-unprecedented situation for a player of his caliber.
Needless to say, a player of Durant's talents and pedigree should demand a historical haul in return. Nonetheless, the Nets have set a price so steep, that no NBA team has been able to meet it, according to ESPN's Brian Windhorst:
“The executives are going on vacation," Windhorst reported. "At this point, the Nets’ preferred situation is for Kevin Durant to stay with them. There is no trade that they’ve got that they like.”
But that doesn't mean that Durant would simply play ball if they refuse to trade him. According to Zach Lowe of ESPN, there are serious concerns about his character and how it could affect the locker room if he's not happy:
"Even if Durant reports, will he be content? Will he sulk? Will trade talk become a day-to-day distraction?" Lowe asked. "The Nets may not want to live that scenario. It's draining."
So, other teams around the league are hanging on to the hope the Nets owner Joe Tsai forces the GM to let him go, even at a discount:
"The wild card has always been whether Joe Tsai, the Nets governor, would ever mandate his front office just do a deal: take 70 cents on the dollar, end the melodrama, move on. Rival suitors are hoping for that kind of intervention," Lowe added.
Also, Marc Stein reports that some teams are hesitant to pull the trigger on the former Warriors star, as he's known for being quite high-maintenance, and no one knows whether they can keep him happy:
"The persistent scuttle around the league, though, is that clubs interested in Durant mostly fear their ability to keep him content more than they feel any concern about his advancing age," Stein wrote. "'If the Nets can’t keep him happy, after everything they’ve given him, how are we supposed to?' one Western Conference team official told me."
There's no denying that Durant is a historical talent and one of the greatest to ever do it, but maybe trading all your assets for him at this point in his career isn't the smartest move.
