It was no Boston Tea Party as Kyrie Irving was showered with jeers in the Nets’ first game of the Eastern Conference Playoffs against the Boston Celtics on Monday night. On top of it all, Brooklyn dropped Game One 115-114 on a buzzer-beater by Jayson Tatum.
Throughout the game, Irving was booed, chanted at, and shown almost every form of disrespect you can imagine. And he didn’t hold back from letting the crowd know what he thought. He pantomimed crying and, as shared extensively on the Internet, even stuck up two middle fingers to the crowd in response. Those actions earned him a fine of $50,000 on Tuesday by the NBA office. A fan-filmed video of him engaging in an inappropriate back and forth exchange with another fan during halftime also didn’t help his case.
Irving is notoriously hot-headed, a self-made “heel,” and a very controversial figure in the league in general. While in Cleveland, he demanded a trade out of LeBron James’ lineup and into his own operation in Boston. There, he filmed a commercial in TD Garden playing one-on-one with his dad, saying, “he’s the reason I wear number 11, and I wanna be the reason no one else will.”
He left for Brooklyn the following year.
Justifiably, Boston fans are upset; and on the biggest stage in the sport, it seems to be getting under Irving’s skin. He scored the game-high 39 points, but couldn’t avoid going back at the fans at every stopgap.
When asked about his actions post-game, he attempted to clarify instead of apologizing.
“I’m gonna have the same energy for them,” Irving said. “There’s only so much you can take as a competitor, and we’re the ones expected to take a humble approach. It’s the playoffs.”
Following Wednesday Night’s Boston-set Game 2, the Nets will return to the friendly confines of the Barclays Center, where Irving should receive a much warmer and supportive ovation from the home crowd that is just happy to have him gracing the court period amid Mayor Adams’ Covid vaccination mandate reversal.
The Nets can actually be viewed as favorites in the series despite being a seven-seed; even after James Harden’s rocky departure, the talent is still up there with the best of them.
At home, the Celtics have the advantage. Should the Nets prove as fortunate, it should make for an interesting series of closely followed events on the hardwood.
