PatAg said:

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What is this nonsense that people only dislike Kyrie because he didnt want to take the vaccine.
Sports media/fans have disliked him long before that. Je has ended up being locker room cancer at every team he has played at.
The vaccine take was just the latest in a long line of "stupid" things he has said in the press that they dont like.

No one ever says he is bad at the game itself

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lol This. There's a host of reasons to dislike (or even really despise) Kyrie. I didn't want to comment on stuff and start anything political, but there's a lot of justified 'hate' of Kyrie.

M.C. Swag said:

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PatAg said:

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What is this nonsense that people only dislike Kyrie because he didnt want to take the vaccine.
Sports media/fans have disliked him long before that. Je has ended up being locker room cancer at every team he has played at.
The vaccine take was just the latest in a long line of "stupid" things he has said in the press that they dont like.

No one ever says he is bad at the game itself

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lol This. There's a host of reasons to dislike (or even really despise) Kyrie. I didn't want to comment on stuff and start anything political, but there's a lot of justified 'hate' of Kyrie.

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Not according to Shak

My comment earlier was specifically about Bill Simmons and Rusillo. We were all there in 2021. They were saying things like Kyrie "doesn't want to play basketball" because Bill was so gung ho on force vaccinating everyone. He hated that Kyrie refused his mandate. Just about everybody in the media did.

To pretend that the covid vax stuff is not relevant in the media criticism of Kyrie is to ignore reality.

Bill hated Kyrie way before that

PatAg said:

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Zachary Klement said:

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PatAg said:

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What is this nonsense that people only dislike Kyrie because he didnt want to take the vaccine.
Sports media/fans have disliked him long before that. Je has ended up being locker room cancer at every team he has played at.
The vaccine take was just the latest in a long line of "stupid" things he has said in the press that they dont like.

No one ever says he is bad at the game itself

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The media definitely did not disdain the guy the way they do now before the vaccine stuff. I think that clearly has had the biggest impact on the way the media views and talks about him.

Also, not sure how valid the team cancer statements are...the players on the Celtics still love him, LeBron does, and KD has remained incredibly loyal to the guy.

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I guess I meant more like, cancer to the coaching staff and front office of the team vs within the locker room I guess. Has he ever left a team on good terms?
and my point is they DID have the same dislike of him before the vaccine stuff, it is just the latest in a long list of things. Though I guess the Hitler stuff is now more recent, lol. Hes just constantly said ridiculous stuff for the last 10 or so years.

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This is not true at all. It grew in 2021 by a significant amount. I can remember the tone of the basketball podcasts before then and how they changed in 2021 because I'm a grown adult and it was only 2 years ago.

I think there's now an inverse correlation between BS hating someone and my liking them. At least BS and all of us will agree Dirk is the GOAT

Guitarsoup said:

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Bill hated Kyrie way before that

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Sure, he hated that Kyrie left the Celtics. He never said Kyrie "doesn't want to play basketball" until the vax year. He impugned Kyrie's work ethic because Kyrie didn't want to risk bodily harm.

They make it seem like Kyrie could just walk away for half a season and you won't know where he is because that's what happened in 2021. Except he did that in 2021 for a legitimate reason. They just don't think it's legitimate.

Lol "legitimate" is a stretch. Kyrie thought the vaccine implanted robots in your brain or something.

Again, setting aside the political stuff because it's just not worth it. He's been a bad business partner for every NBA team he's been a part of. He's gone AWOL multiple times, gets hurt constantly, teams give him EVERYTHING he wants and will demand to be traded, randomly decides to miss playoff games because now he's observing Ramadan(?) I think he even purposefully delayed a knee surgery to use as leverage to force a trade out of cleveland? My memory is a little shot on that one.

Since that title in Cleveland (which I attribute to Lebron), there hasn't been a situation that was IMPROVED by Kyrie Irving's presence. In fact, it's only gotten worse.

For sure. There is a reason none of us are certain he will be on our team next year and that we are paying attention to every rumor around him.

It's also true that Kyrie Irving needs to be on the Mavs this upcoming season. Hopefully it's as friendly of a deal to the Mavs as possible.

If the Mavs are smart we can convince him it's us with him against the world. Focus his negative energy outward lol.

we're all justifiably in a love/hate with Kyrie. I still hold out hope that he'll be more mature this late into his career and that a lot of what he's done in the past has been due to immense pressure, immaturity and being a largely misunderstood personality in a league largely full of dudes that just want to hoop and not be political or philosophical, etc. I feel for him in a way as it must be very tough to be in his shoes and be told to shut up and just play ball when he has a mind that wanders a lot more than most of his peers. I don't think he's handled a lot of it very well and I'm far from famous and have handled a lot of my **** improperly too, so can't imagine being in the limelight 24/7 with the expectations of perfection that come with that.

Having said all of that, I think his move this week to seemingly diss the mavs a bit by "taking meetings" isn't making me too confident on the kyrie maturing front. Sure, he can do what he needs as it is a business, but it's pretty obvious the mavs weren't going to lowball him. Honestly, taking a big deal from us and saving face would've been in his best interests by far because the last 72 hours have been nothing but media roasting of him as they clown on him for thinking there's a market for his services. Bit of a head scratcher to extend the cat and mouse game if he indeed stays in Dallas.

zgolfz85 said:

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we're all justifiably in a love/hate with Kyrie. I still hold out hope that he'll be more mature this late into his career and that a lot of what he's done in the past has been due to immense pressure, immaturity and being a largely misunderstood personality in a league largely full of dudes that just want to hoop and not be political or philosophical, etc. I feel for him in a way as it must be very tough to be in his shoes and be told to shut up and just play ball when he has a mind that wanders a lot more than most of his peers. I don't think he's handled a lot of it very well and I'm far from famous and have handled a lot of my **** improperly too, so can't imagine being in the limelight 24/7 with the expectations of perfection that come with that.

Having said all of that, I think his move this week to seemingly diss the mavs a bit by "taking meetings" isn't making me too confident on the kyrie maturing front. Sure, he can do what he needs as it is a business, but it's pretty obvious the mavs weren't going to lowball him. Honestly, taking a big deal from us and saving face would've been in his best interests by far because the last 72 hours have been nothing but media roasting of him as they clown on him for thinking there's a market for his services. Bit of a head scratcher to extend the cat and mouse game if he indeed stays in Dallas.

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Never know with Cuban lol

Ha touche…surely cubes isn't that dumb though

zgolfz85 said:

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Ha touche…surely cubes isn't that dumb though

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Again, never know with Cuban!

Taurean Prince to the Lakers. Fine by me, I'm not a huge fan.

Breaking: Kyle Kuzma has agreed on a four-year, $102M deal to return to the Washington Wizards, sources tell @wojespn. pic.twitter.com/R8FVEPSP4e

— ESPN (@espn) June 30, 2023

Surprising move by Kuz.

shack009 said:

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Breaking: Kyle Kuzma has agreed on a four-year, $102M deal to return to the Washington Wizards, sources tell @wojespn. pic.twitter.com/R8FVEPSP4e

— ESPN (@espn) June 30, 2023

Surprising move by Kuz.

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This is why the Wizards will never be good

Free agent guard Josh Okogie has reached an agreement to return to the Phoenix Suns, league sources tell @NBAonTNT, @BleacherReport.

— Chris Haynes (@ChrisBHaynes) June 30, 2023

Decent defender but horrific shooter who is always left wide open. If the Suns have to keep running Okogie out there for long minutes, they have a ceiling that is not the finals.

Bruce Brown got almost DOUBLE the MLE on this.

Way more than the Mavs could've given him. Good for him. https://t.co/y3zjdmMkZA

— Nick Angstadt (@NickVanExit) June 30, 2023

****KKKKKKK

Twitter: The Mavs aren’t doing ANYTHING during Free Agency

Me: pic.twitter.com/pyyIut7Rjh

— Don Denham (@don_denham) June 30, 2023

Jerami Grant new average salary is $32 million per year.

That is higher than:
Brandon Ingram
Jamal Murray
Devin Booker
Jalen Brunson
Karl-Anthony Towns
Tyler Herro pic.twitter.com/BdSqwdZ1MD

— StatMuse (@statmuse) June 30, 2023

shack009 said:

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Jerami Grant new average salary is $32 million per year.

That is higher than:
Brandon Ingram
Jamal Murray
Devin Booker
Jalen Brunson
Karl-Anthony Towns
Tyler Herro pic.twitter.com/BdSqwdZ1MD

— StatMuse (@statmuse) June 30, 2023

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Clown world

Suns doing work to fill out their depth with minimum or near-minimum guys. Already re-signed Damion Lee and Okogie. Have signed Drew Eubanks, Keita Bates-Diop, and Chemezie Metu.

Our guy, winner. https://t.co/xiGXPMOFrC

— Nick Angstadt (@NickVanExit) June 30, 2023

It has to be trolling at this point, right?

Told you he'd get under the max

And still have the option of trading just about any non-Luka player.
I feel like Luka and Kyrie SHOULD be able to be a very dangerous combo, we'll see if Kidd can figure it out. I hate putting more responsibility on Luka, but I think he needs to figure out how to be more effective off the ball