Kobe.LeBron.Wade.Howard. How about Kevin Durant? This has been a spectacular basketball summer, but not because certain players moved from one team to another, or the controversy of certain player's personality characteristics (or lack thereof). June through September has been a historic basketball summer because the world may be witnessing (...) the emergence of one of the most young-wise, talent well-rounded, humble-coachable LEADERS in the game of basketball. We are witnessing the public perception transition of this basketball player from "young, talented scorer with unlimited potential" to "possibly the best in the business". Of course, this perception is magnified because team USA is playing in the FIBA tournament, and the rest of the best are at home watching and getting ready for the 2010-2011 NBA season (which will be one of the most exciting seasons in NBA history), but let this article explain how this transition is simply the moments of clarity of the truth.
When Kevin Durant was a 19-year-old rookie, after playing only a few NBA Summer League games, Kevin was invited by Mike Krzyzewski to the Team USA basketball challenge with established NBA stars like Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, Dwight Howard, and Chris Bosh. Kevin did well, scoring 22 pts in a game, but he was ultimately cut from the team in favor of the experienced veterans that eventually won the gold medal in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The experience proved to be invaluable to Kevin, as he started his rookie campaign with a swagger from playing with the best players in the world before the season even started.
He established himself as a leader in scoring immediately and went on the average 20.1 ppg, the first rookie to do so since Allen Iverson. That off-season Kevin experienced something very few NBA players ever experience, which is the movement of a franchise from one city to another, the Seattle Supersonics became the Oklahoma City Thunder, this situation only motivated Kevin even more. He went on to average 25.4 ppg 6.5 rpg 2.8 apg, his scoring was 6th in the league behind Dwayne Wade, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, and Dirk Nowitzki, still Kevin Durant narrowly missed all-star selection, and his team went 23-59. With a burning desire to win and improve, Kevin Durant made another quantum leap in his scoring and leadership, in 2009-2010, Durant averaged 30.1 ppg 7.6 rpg 2.8 apg, and the Oklahoma City Thunder went 50-32, Kevin became the youngest player in NBA HISTORY to average 30 ppg, and the 27-win improvement was the 6th best single season turnaround in NBA history.
The Oklahoma City Thunder made the playoffs as the #8 seed and lost in a 6-game-series, they gave the eventual champion Los Angeles Lakers a tough series, but that leads us to today. When Mike Krzyzewski began building the team that would compete in the FIBA World Championship, it was assured that not only was Kevin Durant on the team, but he would be established as a leader on the team, and he was the only player guaranteed a spot on the team! Regardless of the fact that all of the 2008 Team USA Olympic gold medal winners declined to do the FIBA tournament, it was a powerful vote of confidence for Kevin Durant.
The FIBA world championship basketball team was formed. Derrick Rose, Lamar Odom, Chauncey Billups, Russel Westbrook, Stephen Curry, Kevin Love, Tyson Chandler, Eric Gordon, Andre Igoudala, and Rudy Gay. ESPN analysts called it the "B" team, but the way the team is structured, it is every bit as talented as the 2008 Olympic team, with Kevin Durant as its Kobe Bryant leader. On September 11, 2010, with a spirit of patriotism bursting through the players of Team USA, Kevin Durant, the leading scorer of the team (22.1 ppg, the highest average of any Team USA player in FIBA history) scored 38 points in a 89-74 victory over Lithuania, another record broken (Carmelo Anthony's 35 pts in 2008). Today, Kevin Durant will lead Team USA to the FIBA World Championship, and he will break yet-another record, being the youngest Finals MVP in FIBA history. And he will do it as humbly as he announced his contract extension, maybe not through his twitter account (@KDthunderup), but on the court where the truth is always shown through the game of basketball.
