Kevin Durant Responds to Channing Frye’s ‘Nostalgia’ Rant on Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan

The decades-long debate of today’s NBA versus the league in the 90s has once again resurfaced after retired NBA star Channing Frye’s spirited rant on the issue. Frye believes that fans and analysts are obsessed with comparing the two eras, which has had a very derogatory impact on the modern game. His monologue caught the eye of one of the league’s current superstars, Kevin Durant, who seemed to agree.

In the latest edition of “The Road Trippin Show”, Frye stated that “nostalgia” is what is killing the NBA because modern players are constantly compared to Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant. He also pointed out that MJ and Kobe were “not as clean” as fans remember them to be, pointing to Jordan’s decision to quit to pursue baseball and the Mamba’s infamous 2006 playoff game where he “quit on his team” in their loss against the Suns.

“The rules weren’t even the same,” said Frye regarding the two eras. “You weren’t watching help-side defense. Whose doing this? What is this rule? What is that rule? Nobody celebrates these new people.”

Frye added that this kind of revisionist history has prompted today’s stars to run away from being the face of the league.

An X account named Dime Dropper shared a clip of Frye’s rant with the caption, “You know what killed the NBA more than “nostalgia”? Constant compare culture. We can’t say a player now is great, we have to compare them to a predecessor. In which it becomes subjective & ppl can’t accept the other sides opinion so then they end up hating that player.”

This is where Durant jumped in and wholeheartedly agreed with Frye’s passionate argument. “You and Channing are saying some real sh*t,” the 15-time All-Star tweeted.

Frye makes a valid point. The criticism of today’s NBA has left many of its stars without any sympathy for lovers of the game. This is why Anthony Edwards publicly shot down the idea of being the face of the league.

Even when players stand up for themselves, they get labeled as problematic by the media. It doesn’t matter what era was better. What matters is that they are different.

Kevin Durant has never been shy about speaking his mind

Kevin Durant is above all else, someone who loves the game of basketball. All aspects of it. So when the armies of X or the media analysts criticize the state of the game, he isn’t afraid to shut their nonsense up. Last weekend’s All-Star festivities were a prime example.

The NBA was rightfully getting flack for how far the All-Star weekend had fallen from grace, but Durant was right there to remind everyone about their own misery.

“I think it’s more fun to complain about the nba than to actually watch it,” KD tweeted out. “Crazy, cancel all star weekend and let’s just give everybody a break since we’re so miserable around this time.”

Durant took it one step further. When a fan responded to his post to make some valid claims about the quality drop-off, the Suns’ superstar claimed that fans are never happy.

The NBA will not only lose one of its greatest players whenever Durant decides to retire, but one of the game’s greatest defenders as well: both on and off the court.