Kevin Durant’s Complicated Brooklyn Nets Legacy Is About to Be on Display

Kevin Durant won an MVP and four scoring titles over nearly a decade with the Oklahoma City Thunder, and featured on back-to-back championship-winning teams in his time with the Golden State Warriors. But the legacy the 13-time All-Star left behind in Brooklyn over two-plus seasons playing for the Nets left a lot to be desired.

And ahead of KD’s return to the Barclays Center, he isn’t sure what sort of reception to expect.

“It just depends on how the people wake up,” Durant said this week ahead of a meeting with the Nets in Brooklyn, via the Associated Press. “A lot of people don’t know what to say or how to feel about me. It’s up in the air on what happens.”

Brooklyn hosts Durant’s Phoenix Suns at 8:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday in a nationally televised game on ABC, marking the superstar’s first game back in town since the blockbuster trade nearly a year ago.

The emotions of the fans packing the venue will surely be mixed.

Those same fanatics were surely exhilarated when Durant and All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving signed with the Nets as free agents in 2019. Eventually, former MVP James Harden was thrown into the mix following a trade with the Houston Rockets.

But the results of this Big Three failed to live up to the high-scoring hype. Durant put together a memorable 2021 Eastern Conference Semifinals against the eventual-champion Milwaukee Bucks, culminating in a 48-point performance in a Game 7 overtime loss. Even in defeat, that was supposed to be the start of something great for the Nets.

It wasn’t.

Each member of the dynamic trio missed time with injuries throughout their short time together. Irving was also ineligible to play in home games for a stretch after choosing not to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Harden grew frustrated and was traded to the Philadelphia 76ers for the often-injured Ben Simmons.

And that just about marked the beginning of the end. All three players were eventually shipped out of town. Durant was moved to Phoenix last February as part of a deal that saw Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson and four first-round draft picks heading back to Brooklyn.

Durant played 129 regular-season games with the Nets—and just 16 with both Irving and Harden—over a 3 1/2-year stretch and requested more trades than he won playoff series (one).

“I know people won’t believe it, but it was some fun, fun times,” Durant told reporters this week. “We had some adversity, but getting to know other players who had to step up in those moments throughout that adversity was fun. They filled in for what we were missing and they did that at a phenomenal level and we all had fun in the process. Last season was some of the funnest basketball I ever played.”

Will Nets fans boo the “Slim Reaper” for demanding a departure from Brooklyn? Or perhaps choose to recognize one of the greatest players to ever don—even if for a limited time—the organization’s uniform? That remains to be seen.

But what is already apparent is how Durant would like to be welcomed back. Actually, make that one way he wouldn’t. The two-time Finals MVP said on X, formerly Twitter, this week that he does not want the Nets to prepare a tribute video in his honor, commemorating his time in Brooklyn, for Wednesday’s matchup. Durant said on the platform that the night “will be better without it,” then expanded on that point.

“I don’t feel like I deserve one,” Durant told The Arizona Republic. “I didn’t feel like I stayed there long enough. I didn’t put in enough work. I didn’t leave a lasting impact.”

Newsweek reached out to the Nets on Tuesday for comment.

Brooklyn played spoiler to the Suns in the first regular-season game Durant played alongside his new Big Three—which includes Devin Booker and Bradley Beal—with a four-point win in Phoenix in December. The Suns (27-20, sixth-place Western Conference) have since gotten healthier, and this trio of stars has ironically played the exact number of games (16) together this season as Durant did with Irving and Harden across their entire time in Brooklyn, per the NBA.

Durant is averaging 28.3 points, 6.4 rebounds and 5.7 assists this season going into his reunion with the Nets (19-27, 11th Eastern Conference). The 35-year-old already has a complicated standing with Oklahoma City, where some fans resent him for bolting town and joining the mighty Warriors. And his tenure in Golden State is, to some, clouded by what might be called ring-chasing.

Wednesday night will offer a clear look at how Durant’s Nets tenure is seen.

“I never know how people are going to react,” he said this week, via AP. “I don’t expect anything from anyone. I just want them to do whatever they do that’s going to allow them to have some fun.”