By HoopsHype | February 1, 2025
What’s the buzz on Twitter?
KD: “It’s always good when I run into an older player, especially if they played in the ‘90s, because they feel like that’s the golden years of NBA. Especially GP, I try to let ‘em know what it would have been like if they’d have been on the court w/ me.” espn.com/nba/story/_/id… – 3:17 AM
Duane Rankin @DuaneRankin “I’m going to talk a little s–t to them. So that was fun. I got major respect for GP.” Kevin Durant and Gary Payton talking trash during Suns win over Warriors.
On if he told Payton he never seen anything like him before: “I said something close to that.” #Suns #DubNation pic.x.com/M9XJO4yAyj – 2:31 AM
NBA on ESPN @ESPNNBA “Just come out and grind, do your job every day. I love playing with these guys, love preparing with these guys.”
Kevin Durant reflects on how this season is shaping up for the Suns 🙌 pic.x.com/C3omb1mE9H – 1:16 AM
Duane Rankin @DuaneRankin Kevin Durant and Gary ‘The Glove’ Payton were exchanging words as Payton is sitting right behind the courtside seats. Durant was on the court near that area. Pretty entertaining.
Payton’s son plays for the Warriors. #Suns #DubNation – 11:48 PM
Brandin Podziemski’s two attacks this quarter didn’t go too well. He tried to back down Grayson Allen who chucked him with a forearm and made him give up, then he tried KD one on one and fell down. – 10:38 PM
Tim MacMahon @espn_macmahon Kyrie Irving on Kevin Durant: “He’s that guy that you see almost like a monument in a science museum of just like, what does a great scorer look like?”
As KD approaches 30K, I talked to his teammates over the years about why he’s such a unique scorer: espn.com/nba/story/_/id… – 1:03 PM
Many of you know this, but the only player Suns can offer in 2 way deal for Heat is Beal, and that’s a non-starter for Miami. Suns can’t aggregate players (offer 5 for 1 for example) because they’re 2nd apron team… Durant for Butler and J-Rich works within cap, but Suns – 12:55 PM
Anthony Slater @anthonyVslater
Warriors beat the Thunder at home after falling down 14. Best win since the 12-3 start. Kevon Looney had 18 points, four blocks. Andrew Wiggins 27 on 10/17 FG. Gary Payton II, Dennis Schröder, Brandin Podziemski had moments. A 3-1 homestand closes with Suns, Magic. – 12:50 AM
More on this storyline
“G’s a great sport about it — one of my favorite players, somebody I look up to, got major respect for. I think we started in the summer with Team USA. We were all in the same room with Team USA, and the first thing I said to him was that he couldn’t guard me. ‘You’re too small. Them dudes that played back in the day wasn’t close to me.’ I was just talking crazy to him, so I guess we picked it up from there.” Durant, who scored 19 points in 29 minutes during the win, traded trash talk with Payton for most of the third quarter. Durant finished the quarter with a trio of 3-pointers to stretch the Suns’ lead to 19. At the end of the quarter, he made a beeline toward the corner where Payton was sitting, but Durant was adamant he didn’t need a scoring outburst for fodder in their conversation. -via ESPN / February 1, 2025
Derek Fisher on his famous 0.4 shot vs. Spurs: ‘For a long time it reminded me of a down year, if that makes sense because we lost in the Finals to the Pistons, so I’m like ‘I don’t want to remember 2004’, but you can’t escape the moment. Yeah the play wasn’t design for me, and if you’re on a team with Kobe and Shaq, the play is not for you. I’m not mad about that at all either. So the play wasn’t designed for me, it was really the gravitational pull that the two of those guys have by pulling players towards them, like I just kind of stood there and waited for the right moment to go to the open space and I always give Gary Payton a ton of credit because he was taking the ball out and most guys will force it to the superstars in that situation, because they don’t want to be the one that have to explain ‘why you tried to throw it to this dude as opposed to try to throw it to Kobe or Shaq?!’ So I always give GP major love for making like what was the right basketball decision, it ended up working out but a lot of dudes would have forced that ball to to Kobe or Shaq.’ -via YouTube / January 7, 2025
