Brooklyn Nets Star Kyrie Irving Should Fulfill His Media Obligations Just Like Everyone Else

A recent conversation with a friend who roots for the Brooklyn Nets went something like this.

Him: “I took my son to see Kyrie Irving’s 50-point game last season. He’s incredible.”

Me: “He really is. Which one?”

That is the greatness of Irving: He played in only 20 games in 2019-20, yet scored at least 50 points in two of them.

His scoring prowess is so unique for a point guard who stands just 6-foot-2 — dribble combos that seem straight out of Rucker Park complementing a smooth jumper and acrobatic finishes at the rim.

At 28, Irving already ranks 108th all-time on basketball-reference.com’s Hall of Fame probability list, with a 64.7 percent chance of being inducted. He has six All-Star appearances, an NBA title in which he hit the series-clinching shot, and an Olympic gold medal.

Irving grew up a New Jersey Nets fan in West Orange, NJ, watching Jason Kidd, Kenyon Martin and Richard Jefferson take his hometown team to back-to-back finals in the early 2000s. His love of the franchise is endearing. He knows its history. And his next challenge is to bring a title to Flatbush and Atlantic.

But individual accolades aside, Irving’s first year in Brooklyn didn’t go so well. When he played — with Kevin Durant already ruled out for the season — the team went just 8-12. And Irving’s record talking to reporters was even worse.

After going down with a shoulder injury that would eventually require season-ending surgery, Irving spent several weeks avoiding questions. The lack of information led to many people — especially former coach Kenny Atkinson — being put in uncomfortable situations on a daily basis. Speculation ran wild, with Kendrick Perkins even accusing Irving of faking his injury to avoid facing Celtics fans in his return to Boston.

So when Irving decided to issue a statement rather than take questions on Friday — which all of his teammates have done without a problem, as is required by the league — it wasn’t exactly a surprise. After all, it’s not like he hasn’t done this before.

“COVID-19 has impacted us all in many ways, so I pray for the safety and health of our communities domestically and abroad. I am truly excited for the season to start and I am also praying that everyone remains safe and healthy throughout this journey,” Irving told reporters via PR email, adding that the statement was to “ensure that my message is properly conveyed.

“I am committed to show up to work every day, ready to have fun, compete, perform, and win championships alongside my teammates and colleagues in the Nets organization. My goal this season is to let my work on and off the court speak for itself. Life hit differently this year and it requires us, it requires me, to move differently. So, this is the beginning of that change.”

Almost true to form, the statement was ambiguous on how long Irving’s media silence would last. But his PR representative later clarified to Newsday that it wasn’t expected to span the entire season.

Irving’s decision makes me appreciate Deron Williams and (more from afar) Carmelo Anthony. Through the ups and (mostly) downs, those guys regularly took questions. As every Nets fan knows by now, Williams could be difficult to deal with at times — especially early on. And he never lived up to lofty expectations. Still, he fulfilled his daily media obligations. Beat writers that were around the team everyday got to know about his affinity for the Pittsburgh Steelers, MMA, golf and, most importantly, his family.

Irving is more distant, and his distrust of the media is obvious. It’s been there for a long time, since high school days. He worries his words will be twisted the wrong way — no matter what he says. In that respect, some in aggregation nation aren’t helpful. “He feels like he’s been burned a lot, and people are just going to run with things and blow them out of proportion,” was how one person who knows Irving well put it. “This was him trying to take control of the situation.”

Yet Irving has to take at least some of the blame in that. What did he think was going to happen when he said the world was flat? When he said it was glaring that last year’s Nets were one or two pieces away? When he said Durant gave him a quality late-game option for the first time in his career? When he said of first-year boss Steve Nash: ‘I don’t really see us having a head coach.’”

Context is important, and Irving’s candor on many subjects is greatly appreciated. He also deserves credit for his concerns about the bubble and mental health amid the pandemic, police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement. He has continually given back to the community in the form of philanthropic endeavors. It’s all commendable. He’s the VP of the Players’ Association for a reason.

But there has to be some accountability on his part for sparking past controversies, his sometimes long-winded, ambiguous answers leading others to form their own conclusions on what he actually meant.

The player empowerment era is very important — and stars have more money and more avenues to speak directly to fans than ever — but it’s also important for all players to answer questions so their teammates don’t have to answer for them. It’s like wearing a mask during the pandemic in this sense: you do it to help others as much as you do it to help yourself.

Transparency helps foster better relationships and understanding. It’s good for all parties: players, reporters and fans. The NBA also mandates that all players be available to reporters or risk being fined by the league.

Irving set the tone for how he wants things to be going forward, on his terms. But he needs to be able to handle the tough questions, just like everyone else has in this town for decades. All New York sports fans — and by extension, reporters — ask is that their favorite players play hard and be accountable: win or lose.

Winning and meeting expectations, of course, is the best way to endear yourself to NYC fanbases. And making no excuses is appreciated if you come up short. Kyrie Irving will have every opportunity to do that playing next to Kevin Durant on a very talented team with championship aspirations.

Irving is also perfectly capable of handling his media responsibilities. Whether he wants to is another story.