Boston Celtics
Post by Ian Noble on Jul 13, 2016 22:13:08 GMT
KEVIN DURANT
Oklahoma City ThunderKevin Durant signs a two year $59,592,519 deal to remain with the Oklahoma City Thunder!
2016/17 - $28,242,900
2017/18 - $31,349,619
Total:- $59,592,519
The battle for Kevin Durant eventually came down to the two teams who met in the Finals this year - the Charlotte Hornets and his re-signing team the Oklahoma City Thunder.
As I said in the shoutbox a few days ago the negotiations spanned over 8,500 words, that's 32 pages, and there were only four teams bidding for his services. The obsessive efforts of James Kay have been ever-present for the player agents this year and I don't think anyone gave more effort than he has for Kevin Durant, and the same was true of Kawhi Leonard. The passion that his own re-signing GM, Kevin Hollis, poured into his offers was also stunning, difficult to put into words if I'm honest. I know that coming second in this process would be personally devastating for either GM, I am very sorry that GM has to be James Kay.
Everyone knows how good a GM James Kay is around the league but I don't think anybody knows the level of effort he has put into Off Season Free Agency this year. D5 means a lot to so many of us, James showed that it means more to him than most.
Throughout the Durant negotiations I also personally wanted to really push the negotiations to be as thorough as possible. For every factor each of the GMs asked me to consider I countered with a criticism or agreed and gave credit and invited further discussion. Not a single stone has been left unturned.
Negotiations for Kevin Durant initially centred around the fact that in real life Kevin Durant joined the team who beat him this year, so why shouldn't he leave OKC for Charlotte in D5? Durant may have left Westbrook in real life but at D5 these two guys haven't played alongside each other for five years! We have no idea how a Durant/Westbrook/Ibaka Thunder would've looked like in D5 because it was one of the first trios that was ended! It was great to bring a fantasy D5 element into negotiations like this; wouldn't Durant want to join the team who beat him, just like he did in real life, as well as re-join his "brothers" from the start of D5?
However whether Westbrook (and Ibaka) were push or pull factors at all in the decision became a moot point when you consider that Durant left OKC in real life with at least Westbrook on the roster and Ibaka having left only a few days before, they were not pull factors enough to keep Durant in Oklahoma in real life, they should not be considered pull factors enough to join Charlotte in D5.
Kevin Durant joined Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and the Golden State Warriors in real life. But at D5 Durant led an injury plagued Thunder team past Steph, Klay and another guy called Lebron James as he and Demarcus Cousins won the Western Conference Finals by themselves! The team who faced Charlotte did so without Tyreke and Conley and, when you look at the lineups of every team on paper, the Oklahoma City Thunder beat what is widely regarded as the most feared team in the league!
One area in which Charlotte had the upper hand was the strength of the team he could put around Kevin Durant. Aside from D5 Finals MVP Russell Westbrook and Serge Ibaka you have Khris Middleton spacing the floor for Durant, the up and coming defensive specialist in Nerlens Noel and even the most Durant-esqe player to join the league since 2007 in Brandon Ingram who would have flourished under Kevin's tutelage, looking up to the player he modelled his game on.
One factor which was a head-scratcher for me was Kevin Hollis's plans to play Tyreke Evans at point guard next season. Tyreke played point for New Orleans this year but he's not a pure point guard. OKC abandoned any hope of re-signing Mike Conley this year, he will be going to a different team, and the absence of a pure-facilitator was clearly a turn off. However Marcus Morris was signed so that Durant could play his natural Small Forward position and when it comes down to it OKC are even a "middling" team, they are one of the elite forces in the league, they had a spectacular season and have done every year that D5 has been running.
In addition to this signing I actually should apologise to Kevin Hollis because he still had $20 million of cap space left to sign an extra player, and as Overseer I know exactly who he would have signed, but a lot is riding upon this decision, OSFA remains at stalemate until it's made, and I felt Off Season Free Agency needed to get moving for the sake of league as well as the overall stress levels of James Kay and Kevin Hollis!
Lastly, after five years of D5 loyalty, two of which have been under Kevin Hollis, Mr Hollis began his chase for Durant on the exact moment the clock struck 12 midnight on July 1st. The dedication of the Thunder is the real story here. Dedication is more important here at D5 than in real life and it takes a display of a lack of effort and engagement, or a team in a questionable situation, to really undermine that dedication enough to prise one of the greatest players of all time from one of the best D5 teams of all time. Prior to Off Season Free Agency Mr Kay showed what might have been the grandest gesture to begin this year's Off Season Free Agency when he traded away a player oozing with superstar status, Andrew Wiggins, merely to make the cap space work so he could propel his team even beyond it's current championship contending status to even higher levels. If this was not then matched by genuine heartfelt personal begging and pleas in messages from Mr Hollis it may well have levelled the playing field.
This was the hardest fought battle for a player I've ever had to negotiate, I've even spent over two hours writing this up! Huge credit should also go to the third-placed contenders for Kevin Durant; the Miami Heat! Troy Bolton was no less devastated when he received my message in the post, and I don't really have any words of consolation for he or James Kay other than that they are obviously hugely respected GMs, I would have loved to send Durant to the Heat, I would have loved to send Durant to the Hornets, they've both earned him, they've both fought for him, they would both be one of the championship favourites with him on their team. These guys did everything they could have done to entice Kevin Durant to their team, it's really a tragedy that there's only one player and one destination; the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Charlotte Hornets
