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2024 Paris Olympics

Kevin Durant appears unhappy with exclusion from new Nike Olympics campaign

© Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

Phoenix Suns superstar Kevin Durant posted a series of curious messages on his Instagram story after Nike did not include him in its newest Olympic campaign.

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“@nike tell me, Am I a bad person?????” the first post from Durant read.

Nike’s newest ad campaign for the 2024 Paris Olympics is entitled “Winning Isn’t for Everyone.” The brand released a commercial today that was narrated by William Defoe and featured numerous athletes, including NBA stars Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Victor Wembanyama. It showcases the intensity that athletes go through to reach elite status.

“You can’t win them all, but you should sure as hell try. Bring on the odds, play like you mean it. Because if you don’t want to win, congrats. You’ve already lost,” Nike added on Instagram with the ad. 

Serena Williams, Sha’Carri Richardson, Sophia Smith, Bebe Vio, Qinwen Zheng, Jakob Ingebrigtsen, Cristiano Ronaldo, A’ja Wilson, Ixhelt Gonzales, Vini Jr., Sabrina Ionescu and Eliud Kipchoge, are the other athletes featured in the campaign.

 

Nike first signed Durant in 2007 when he was drafted No. 2 overall by the Seattle Supersonics. Durant recently launched his 17th signature shoe with Nike, the KD17, and is one of four athletes to have a lifetime deal with the company, along with James, Michael Jordan, and Cristiano Ronaldo.

With this being an Olympics campaign, Durant is statistically the best Olympian ever for the United States men’s basketball team. He is Team USA men’s basketball’s all-time Olympic-leading point scorer (435 points) and has scored 640 points overall in his international career (most-ever for Team USA across the Olympics and FIBA). Durant has been a part of the last three Olympic teams, who have all won the gold medal with Durant as their leading scorer every year.

In relation to Durant’s first post, the commercial starts off by saying, “Am I a bad person?”

Durant’s other posts showed pictures of him winning gold medals at the Olympics with Team USA.

The first was a picture alongside James, Bryant and Carmelo Anthony with the caption: “Been wit yall every step of the way @nike.”

The next two were pictures of Durant and Team USA winning gold at the 2016 and 2020 Olympics, one captioned, “Even during the quarantine Olympics @nike,” in reference to the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 that were played under restrictions of COVID-19.

Durant’s agent, Rich Kleiman, seemed to confirm the frustration with Durant’s omission from the campaign in a tweet that read:

“i remember when hardly anyone wanted to play in the olympics during covid, but coming off an achilles tear a year earlier, (Durant) went to Tokyo and had the all time highest scoring average and won his 3rd Gold medal! A story is only as real as it’s told!”

James is the only active member of the Team USA men’s basketball Olympic team featured in the ad, although Bryant previously played for Team USA. The other athletes in the campaign are the only ones included from a combination of their respective sports and countries.

After dealing with a calf strain for Team USA’s first three exhibition games, Durant practiced for the first time with the team today. He unveiled a KD17 “Team USA” colorway ahead of the Olympics last month.

Do you think Durant should feel slighted about not being included in the ad?

Kevin Durant practices for 1st time with Team USA

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Brendan Mau is a senior writer covering the Phoenix Suns and more for Burn City Sports. You can follow him on X via @Brendan_Mau

 

 

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