Natalia Chi
NEW YORK — All-Star guard Kyrie Irving has asked the Brooklyn Nets for a trade, according to ESPN and The Athletic.
Irving made the demands after talks about a new contract weren’t to his liking, news outlets reported Friday.
The NBA trade deadline is Thursday. The Nets, who suffered his 43-point loss in Boston on Wednesday, open his five-game homestand against Washington on Saturday. They have played six of their last seven games before the All-Star break at home. The only “road” game in that stretch is the New York Knicks.
However, it’s unclear at this time if Irving will be part of it.
Irving’s agent and stepmother, Sheteria Irving, told Bleacher Report last week that he reached out to the Nets about the contract extension. Kyrie Irving, whose current contract with the Nets expires this season, is eligible for a four-year deal worth up to $200 million.
“I reached out to the Nets on this,” Sheteria Irving told Bleacher Report. It’s a nice type of extension, and that means telling now if the ball is on the Nets’ court and their hopes are the same.”
A tweet was posted to Irving’s account shortly before the first reports of the deal request came out. As is often the case with Irving when it comes to posting on social media, it wasn’t clear what exactly he was referring to in the post.
“To my peers: just be yourself and grow! Surround yourself with people who will bless you unconditionally and appreciate all the hard work put in.
To my colleagues: Be yourself and grow!
Have someone by your side who will bless you unconditionally and appreciate your hard work.Stay away from people who manipulate, hate, or hurt you.
spatula
🤞🏾♾— Hera (@KyrieIrving) February 3, 2023
Brooklyn is 31-20 this season, fourth in the Eastern Conference standings going into Friday, and is 4-7 since fellow All-Star Kevin Durant injured his knee in a game in Miami on Jan. 8. It has become. He’ll probably be back with the Nets by then, as he’s on record saying he wants to play in his February 19th All-Star game.
Durant also asked the Nets for a trade this summer before he got his head down. And it was around this time last year that Brooklyn traded James Harden (whom the Nets thought would be Durant and Irving’s Big Three) to the Philadelphia 76ers, bringing Ben Simmons to Brooklyn.
Whatever happens between now and Thursday, this is the beginning of a new story surrounding Irving.
He was suspended eight games earlier this season by the Nets, a disappointment after the Nets repeatedly failed to “make it clear he has no anti-Semitic beliefs.” This came shortly after Irving refused to issue an apology after NBA Commissioner Adam Silver asked him to post a link to anti-Semitic works on his Twitter feed. Irving also ended up losing his long relationship with Nike as part of the heavy impact from his tweet and the reactions that followed.
“I don’t stand for hate speech or anything that borders on anti-Semitism or anything that is against humanity,” Irving said on the day the Nets reinstated him in November.
Irving also missed much of the 2021-22 season after refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Pandemic.
He also had no shortage of controversial opinions in his career – repeatedly questioning whether the earth was round before finally apologizing to his science teacher.
