there never was any loyalty, was there?
It is worth noting that Kevin Durant did not start out playing for the Oklahoma City Thunder. He was drafted second by the Seattle Sonics, a team which traded its entire roster and operations to the Oklahoma City Thunder, and in doing so folded — or, so it seems written in the fine print — was placed in hiatus. (The curious thing on being drafted for fans of a major league team in Seattle was to see this promising young rookie and know there was a better than even chance he would be playing elsewhere next year. The other curious thing is that once some team reappears in Seattle, they will claim the past legacies of their 1970s championship and that Gary Payton player and even the first year of Kevin Durant…)
Westbrook follows Durant in leaving Oklahoma City, meaning — it is believed — the end of any decent team in the city of Oklahoma City, and a curious “ugh” on the order of Lebron James joining with two other big names in forming a “Big 3” in Miami to, ultimately, win 2 championships and lose 2 others.
But now he’s played for three different logos / entities, and there is no link left in the NBA to the last Seattle Sonics one. Ergo, fans in Oklahoma City should feel less badly than fans in Cleveland about James.
But basketball has gotten to annoy me as a sport, and I’ve diced it up to simply being that the limited roster leads to less of a sense of continuity and cohesion through the years, so goes Durant, so goes “Mr. Miami Heat” Dwayne Wade, so goes it all.