Kevin Durant Rightfully Calls Out Narrative-Hungry Media After His On-Court Spat With Coach

Kevin Durant and Suns head coach Mike Budenholzer had a brief spat during a break in the action of Phoenix's game against the Los Angeles Clippers on Tuesday night. While many were quick to criticize Durant in the heat of the moment, the 15-time All-Star made it clear after the contest that those folks were trying to turn nothing into something.

During a timeout early in the game, Durant was seen yanking his arm away from Budenholzer before a quick back-and-forth that included the head coach giving his star player an obvious look of disappointment.

When you have a star player in any sport, let alone Kevin Durant who is no stranger to extreme criticism, have a moment like this with their coach, there is going to be that narrative that the player was in the wrong and the coach was simply doing his job.

Durant is fully aware of that, and immediately cleared the air about the situation while calling out the bogus ‘narrative’ the media was eager to run with after the game. He also mentioned that the Suns winning the game shifted that mindset from reporters, but if Phoenix lost, it would have motivated them even more so, which is totally fair.

"That's what usually happens when you don't know the dynamics of the relationship. You catch something on TV, you get a quote and now you're pushing that narrative as if me and Bud don't do sh-t all the time," Durant told reporters after the game. "We [are] competitive as two individuals who want to see things done the right way, and sometimes my way ain't the way that Bud want to do it and vice versa."

"He allows me as a player on the team, a veteran on the team, to voice my opinion. If we both didn't care, we would never have stuff like that, you know what I'm saying? So I'm glad that the win is going to sweep all of that stupid stuff under the rug," he continued. "Because people couldn't wait. Even some people in Phoenix, in here, couldn't wait to run with that and say, 'This is the reason why the team ain't playing well, because of that specific thing.' But come on man, that shows that me and Bud really care about trying to right this ship and trying to win basketball games."

Zero lies detected.

Durant's comments here were not only spot on, but important ones to remember in this instant reaction, instant gratification obsessed society we're living in, both in and out of sports.

We all scream for players and coaches to show more emotion and urgency - especially when we're talking about regular season NBA games - and KD and Budenholzer showed both of those things because they want to see things being done the right way. As Durant explained, sometimes that means disagreeing, fighting through a tough stretch to find the result, and then in this case, looking up at the end of the game and seeing your team on top.

We saw Travis Kelce rip into Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid during the 2024 Super Bowl. The tight end was furious in the moment, but that anger showed that he cared about what was taking place out on the field.

A bigger red flag in Durant's situation on Tuesday or any others to come when the going gets tough would be showing no emotion, pouting, and laying down.

Phoenix trailed the Clippers by 23 points at one point on Tuesday night yet managed to pull off the comeback win, and it's fair to point to Durant's moment with his coach as a contributing factor to that.