Brooklyn Nets: They are at the complete and utter mercy of Kyrie Irving

The Brooklyn Nets organization is currently unsure about the level of availability of their superstar point guard, Kyrie Irving. Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN stated on October 5th, that the organization was losing hope that Irving would get the COVID-19 vaccine before the start of the regular season on October 19th.

If Irving refuses to get the vaccine before October 19th, he is staring at the possibility of only playing 36 games during the 2021-22 campaign. Players need to be vaccinated to play in New York and certain parts of California (i.e., Los Angeles and San Francisco).

The Brooklyn Nets have found themselves in an impossible situation. Here’s why they have almost no leverage in the Kyrie Irving situation.

Irving’s current refusal to get the vaccine has led media members to say that the organization should look to move him at some point during the season. For example, during a Round Table, John Hollinger of The Athletic ($$$) stated that a trade was an avenue that Brooklyn should explore if Kyrie doesn’t want to get the vaccine.

Unfortunately, trading Irving is an unrealistic proposition at this point due to his relationship with the best player on the team, Kevin Durant. Durant stated on his podcast that he cultivated a relationship with Irving due to a mutual friend they had at Nike.

The mutual friend, marketing executive Jeff Rodgers, decided to put them in a text message thread together before their first professional meeting during the 2011-12 season. After that first encounter, both players kept in touch, but their relationship didn’t blossom until the 2016 Olympics, where they were teammates on Team USA.

The Olympics gave them a chance to talk basketball every day during the two weeks. Once the Olympics culminated, they kept on talking every day about basketball strategy. For example, Durant would ask Irving how his mentality would change after his former coach, Brad Stevens, took him out at the 6-minute mark of the first quarter. The answer to those questions would give Durant a different perspective on how to approach the game mentally.

These conversations led Durant and Irving to realize that they should play together at some point in their careers. They started having conversations about a potential union during the 2018-19 season.

They concluded that they should team up during the 2019 All-Star game in Charlotte but didn’t know the location. Irving was able to convince Durant to go to Brooklyn, which was his childhood team. Durant was on board as Brooklyn gave him a chance to be in a  big city without all of the media attention as they are the second team in town to the New York Knicks.

When both players signed with the Brooklyn Nets, they said that the Nets would be their final team. It appears that they still feel that way, as Irving’s agents have told other teams that he would retire if traded. Irving also still has the full support of Durant, as he reportedly rejected the idea of trading Irving for Ben Simmons.

Things could get even uglier for the Brooklyn Nets

Consequently, if Brooklyn were to trade Irving, it would be a lose-lose situation for them, as they are likely to get a lesser trade package for him because of his retirement threat. More importantly, they would risk angering Durant due to his close bond with Irving. If the team angers Durant, he could ask for a trade a year from now to a different team, forcing Brooklyn to enter a rebuild.

Unfortunately, in January, Brooklyn weakened their draft pick capital as they traded away three first-round draft picks and four first-round pick swaps in the James Harden deal. Consequently, they would have to go back to their 2016 rebuild, where they would acquire depressed young assets and draft picks in exchange for taking a bad contract.

For example, the Lakers wanted to clear Timofey Mozgov’s $48 million off the books in 2017 as they were preparing for the arrival of LeBron James in 2018. Brooklyn was willing to take Mozgov’s contract as long as an asset was in the deal.

The Lakers agreed to Brooklyn’s request as they included D’Angelo Russell in the trade. Russell had fallen out of favor with the Lakers due to his immaturity during the Nick Young incident.

Therefore, the Brooklyn Nets must hope that Irving changes his mind about getting the vaccine at some point during the season. If not, they have no choice but to accept Irving with his limited availability to avoid potential collateral damage.