puis dans la liste qui s’affiche, cliquez sur AdBlock
Par Pierre-Andréa Fraile | Journaliste sportif
As ever present on social networks, Kevin Durant has not escaped the debate raging there about the emergence of international stars and the alleged decline of American basketball. A debate in which he got involved virally.
Following Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s coronation, this makes seven consecutive years that a non-American player has won the MVP trophy. That was all it took for US-born and -based NBA fans to become alarmed at the power of international players. And according to some, like Black Sports Online creator Robert Littal, this is due to a different approach to youth development:
Robert Littal: Want to see the difference between American and international training? Watch the Netflix documentary on the Olympic Games. European coaches are ruthless. They yelled at (Nikola) Jokic like he was Michael Olowokandi. We’ve become too soft a country. You can’t say anything without someone feeling offended.
Kevin Durant eases up on NBA internationalization
Considered more ruthless and therefore better trainers than their American counterparts, European coaches would therefore have had their part to play in the alleged transition taking place in the NBA. However, this opinion remains marginal and unacceptable in the eyes of other Internet users. On X, for example, Kevin Durant came out against Littal and criticized such reasoning:
Kevin Durant: Most of these successful international guys either are influenced heavily by American basketball culture, played high school ball in America, some even went to college here. This whole conversation is trash. Basketball is a universal language, some people have different dialect. Some states teach the game different than other states, who says there’s a perfect way to teach the game? All this s*** is corny
To back up his point, the Suns star cited two examples of recent international MVPs who came up through the ranks in the United States:
@Gareth_giggs: Neither Jokic, Giannis, nor Luka went to high school or college in the U.S.
Kevin Durant: Embiid did, Shai did too.
Moreover, according to the Slim Reaper, putting all European and American coaches in the same box would be wrong-headed and somewhat presumptuous:
Kevin Durant: People talk like they know every coach lol. Not all European coaches are great and not all American coaches are bad. It’s as simple as that. This whole debate is just futile in my eyes. What are we trying to prove?
