'It's A Clusterf***'!' Kyrie Irving Misquoted as Mavs Lose Again - WATCH
The Dallas Mavericks are being labeled a "catastrophe'' by The Athletic and a "debacle'' by ESPN and "dog shit'' by their own coach. In a sense, as Dallas slips farther away from a playoff shot after yet another loss on Wednesday at the Philadelphia 76ers, we all find ourselves in a furious race to pick an adjective that truly captures the struggles and disappointments.
So who better than deep-thinking Mavs newcomer Kyrie Irving to give it a go?
"A clusterf***,'' Kyrie said after the 116-108 loss at Philly, dropping the Mavs' record to 37-40 on the season.
"Clusterf***''? If Kyrie is trying to low-key the Mavs' problems - from young superstar Luka Doncic not having any "fun'' on down - what a suicidally awful way for the vet to characterize his new team.
Except ... that's not what Kyrie did. At all.
The All-Star's actual quote (see our video and transcript from DBcom's Grant Afseth in Philly) came in response to a question not about the Mavs as a franchise or as a team, but rather about a query about Dallas' present status as the franchise that last year made the Western Conference Finals is this year in danger of falling short of the final play-in spot in the West.
That actual quote?
“What does our future look like? I think that now, again, just where we are in the season, and where other teams are positioned already, it kind of looks like a bit of a clusterf***, to be honest with you,” said Irving. “Because we’re 37-40, and we’re trying to fight to get into the play-in game. It’s not the expectations I don’t think any of us had in that locker room and me getting traded midseason.”
And there you have it.
Did one ESPN correspondent (Tim Bontemps) purposely twist Kyrie's words? We doubt malicious intent (it appears ESPN deleted the tweet without explanation or apology, a bad look), but no matter; the Kyrie toothpaste is out of the tube.
Same, by the way, with the rumors of dissent between Luka and Kyrie and Christian Wood and Tim Hardaway Jr. and coach Kidd and holy hell how does winning basketball get accomplished amid all of this rubbish?
We continue to be told that much of Luka's unhappiness is a personal issue, not a Mavs one. We also continue to be told that controversy aside ("Kyrie is going to be out of the NBA next year''? What?!), Irving's experience in Dallas has been a positive one.
Are there chemistry problems in Dallas? This may be "chicken-or-egg''; being a "catastrophic'' team can create unhappiness. ... or it can occur the other way around.
More likely, we think: Are there problems with the makeup of coach Jason Kidd's roster (defense, size, depth, managerial stubbornness) that can only be solved when Luka and Kyrie overcome their glaring other-end-of-the-floor shortcomings to combine to score a zillion points?
The results on the Kyrie Irving Experiment are not yet in. Maybe, in the end, the whole thing will be judged to have been a "clusterf***.'' But if Irving himself ever says that? In fairness, we owe it to the Mavs and to their audience to make certain we've got the context right.
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