A reunion of former Boston Celtics on Kevin Garnett’s Area 21 show Monday night mostly got attention for the juicy details about Ray Allen’s non-existent relationship with his ex-teammates. But the show also revealed that Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook may be on better terms than we thought.
Kendrick Perkins, a former teammate of both Durant and Westbrook in Oklahoma City, says Durant and Westbrook are speaking for the first time since Durant left the Thunder for the Golden State Warriors. Perkins shared a story of exchanging texts with Durant toward the end of the season after Westbrook broke the NBA’s single-season triple-double record. In one exchange, Durant claimed he had a conversation with Westbrook.
“And so the night that, I think the night that Russ actually broke the record, I had texted KD the next day,” Perkins explained, as transcribed by UPROXX. “He was talking about something, and he sent me a text and was like ‘Hey, man, me and Russ had a nice conversation yesterday.’ The media don’t even know nothing about it, but I just let it be known that they back on talking terms.”
Considering how much shade Westbrook has tossed around and how Durant seemed to put his time with the Thunder behind him without looking back, it was easy to buy into the idea these two stars were not very cordial to each other. Durant suggested the feud between the two players was fabricated by the media (because, FAKE NEWS), and Perkins backed up that idea in his interview.
“Believe it or not, though, I was trying to figure out a way to make them talk again,” Perkins explained. “Because I felt like the outside world was putting a beef there that really wasn’t too serious, you know what I mean?”
The season-long drama between the Warriors and Thunder was given some extra juice as a result of Durant leaving the Thunder for the Warriors after losing to Golden State in the playoffs last season. There was a glimmer of mutual respect during the all-star game at least, which drew a fun response.
[UPROXX]
