A smug Kyrie Irving doesn't care that he never notified LeBron James of trade demand: Bill Livingston (photos)
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Updated on September 19, 2017 at 7:52 AMPosted on September 19, 2017 at 6:05 AM
By
Bill Livingston, The Plain Dealer
blivingston@plaind.com
CLEVELAND, Ohio - Kyrie Irving did not pause in his television
interview with Stephen A. Smith on Monday to look at the camera, raise an uncomplimentary finger, and say,"This one is for you, LeBron."
But the ex-Cleveland Cavalier, current Boston Celtic, and full-time admirer of the wonderfulness of himself came very close to it.
A smirking KyMe said he didn't tip James off to his trade demand because of his insufficiency of spotlight command, saw no reason why he should have, and, basically, didn't give a damn how James felt about it.
Grievances? What grievances?
It's hard to know what twisted Irving into such a misshapen distortion of the "true point guard" he claims he wants to be in Boston. He was all offense here. Irving's lax defense was tolerated. James distributed the ball more effectively and willingly.
Indeed, James:
- Openly forecast that Irving could some day become an NBA Most Valuable Player.
- Took fewer shots last season during the regular season and barely more in the playoffs than Irving.
- Willingly deferred to Irving the final minute of the seventh game of the NBA Finals so the tie-breaking play could be run, not for James, but for his teammate.
It resulted in Irving's championship-winning step-back 3-pointer over Steph Curry.
Warning signs
That shot will live forever even if the maker of it -- blessed as he was with almost undreamed-of ingenuity around the basket, along with mid-range accuracy and 3-point back-breakers -- was cursed with a megalomania he could never quite suppress.
Signs of resentment popped up from time to time of the point guard's belief that too meager measures of adoration went to him.
At the end of a tight playoff game in Detroit in 2015, Irving waited for a pass in the side court from James, who was dribbling the clock down in the middle of the floor, then rolled his eyes in exasperation and sulked off to the corner after James' directed him to go there.
That was the series during which Irving proclaimed that the Cavs had "two of the best closers in basketball" on their team, himself and the guy who was called a king.
No. 2 on the roster, No.1 in attitude
Knowing what we know now, Irving's very number - 2 -- was the biggest problem of a man who wanted only the best for No. 1.
It's not enough to paint Irving as just one case of self-absorption in an epidemic of me-firsters who have been assured since AAU ball of their place in the basketball firmament.
It is a matter of what Irving threw away in the interest of self-aggrandizement.
Irving left behind the consensus best player in the world as a teammate; forsook a team that had been to three straight NBA Finals and won an NBA championship; stiffed a coach in Ty Lue who did not mind KyMe's no-pass, one-touch, 10-second possessions; bailed on fans who treated James, Kevin Love and KyMe like a triumvirate of Roman rulers after their seventh-game, final-minutes plays; then trolled his old team ceaselessly since the season ended.
It is a shame that it ended so badly. Irving was here for six years, so it is not as if he was a mercenary passing through.
Perhaps the animosity he has created will fade. But for now, the season-opener at The Q against Boston will be a regular season game with intensity unmatched except for the Golden State rivalry.
Irving thought he deserved more from Cleveland. The reverse was true.
