Kevin Durant Explains Challenges of New Integration with Rockets

Kevin Durant is easily the best plug-and-play NBA player of all-time. It's easy to assimilate him into any offense or offensive system.

Regardless of the players around him or whomever is on the roster. The Houston Rockets forward can excel.

He gets to his spots on the floor and doesn't take away shots or looks from his teammates. It's a tried and true formula that's spanned nearly two decades.

It's how he, Russell Westbrook and James Harden (three MVPs and all-time greats) were able to thrive together simultaneously and come eerily close to knocking off the Miami "Heatles", headlined by LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.

Durant joined a Golden State Warriors team with a Hall of Fame trio of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green and catapulted the team even further, rather than take away from the cohesiveness that had been established (which oftentimes happens).

Durant and the Warriors won two championships, and he took home both Finals MVP awards.

Durant played for the Brooklyn Nets and Phoenix Suns and went on formidable postseason runs with both franchises.

Again, he can play anywhere, with any cast of characters.

However, this season with the Rockets has been more of a challenging integration for him. The 37-year-old joined Unguarded with Rockets point guard Fred VanVleet to explain.

"I pride myself on being able to figure it out amongst a lot of different playstyles. It’s been hard this season because we don’t play traditional, the way I’ve played. I haven’t played with a big fella like Alpi. And on top of that, another one like Steve. And then having Twin, who is 6-7. I haven’t played with this much size before."

It's not like Durant is having a bad season. Far from it.

He's averaging 25.1 points, 4.7 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 51.3 percent from the field, 42 percent from deep, 89.4 percent from the foul line and 63.3 percent true shooting.

However, he's turned the ball over at least five times in five of the Rockets' last seven games. All told, he's averaging 3.2 turnovers total, which doesn't seem all that bad.

Counting stats don't always tell the story.

Durant has faced blitzes and traps when teams have made it a point to stop him. When he tries to pass out of the doubles, it's seemingly led to instant turnovers.

Rockets coach Ime Udoka needs to find different ways to prevent traps for Durant, and identifying off-ball screens and actions would be a great start towards making things easier for Durant.

It would also not be a bad thing if Durant was a bit more aggressive, especially in clutch situations.