That speculation about Kevin Durant? Looks like it was right on the money

It appears Kevin Durant got everything he wanted from his Warriors’ experience — and less.

Writing for Bleacher Report, Sean Highkin reports everything we surmised about Durant’s state of mind as he headed for a collision course between his time at Golden State and the 2019 free agent sweepstakes.

Highkin writes that Durant began to become disenchanted after his first season with the Dubs — which ended with a championship.

“With that he thought would come validation, but he and his Golden State teammates quickly became widely reviled for ‘ruining’ the NBA. Fans would never love him the way they did Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green.”

The just-concluded season, which the Warriors hoped would end with a third consecutive NBA championship was wall-to-wall spectacle — the addition of a fifth All-Star in DeMarcus Cousins, the omnipresent talk about a three-peat, the on-court spat between Green and Durant, the team’s intermittent inclination to go through the motions. The postseason was grueling just to watch.

Highkin: “Considering the tensions between Durant and Green and the near-constant speculation about (Durant’s) future felt like the logical conclusion of that run even before Durant’s significant injury.

“If he was frustrated by the lack of personal credit he got in Golden State, he’ll get plenty by winning in Brooklyn. Any hardware he picks up in his third stop will mean more because he did it on his terms.”

Another Bleacher Report story, authored by Howard Beck, supports the theme.

“What some found refreshing about the Warriors — their big personalities, their outspokenness on both on- and off-court issues — Durant found distracting. He wanted a team that placed basketball above all else.”

It says here you can’t have it both ways. Durant is a huge NBA personality, craving credit, seeking validation and looking for his share of the love. And the byproduct of all that is industrial-strength distractions.