Durant has left agent Rob Pelinka and Landmark Sports to throw up the ROC with Jay-Z and Roc Nation Sports.
“[Durant] wants Jay-Z to handle his branding,” a source told Yahoo! Sports. “He had a chance to be with his idol and couldn’t say no.”
I had a convo with Maks G, who casually observed that Durant has the most commercials of anyone in the NBA. And yeah, he edges CP3 and Cliff Paul and Blake Griffin's dry humored KIA commercials. Now with Jay and his creative team by his side, I only see Durant's brand involved in even more memorable commercials and mainstream notoriety in general. Should be something to keep in the back of your mind. And now, what will the ripple effect be for more athletes to join Jay & the ROC?!
Oh no, KD. I get getting your story out there and encourage the passion for rapping, but technically speaking, I'm not a fan of your flow. Gotta have more rhythm and smoothness to it, like your J. The 'n' words may not help the squeaky clean family image he's built up as an NBA superstar. Curious to hear what you guys think as well?
Also, I may or may not have chosen the pic of Chevy Woods with a Miami Heat hat on for irony sake.
From foes in the Western Conference Finals to emcees on the same track, the news comes out today in a new interview with Stephen Jackson that he has tabbed Kevin Durant as a featured guest, amongst many, for his upcoming album. Here are the quotables (the last one being an instant classic). (shouts 2 XXL).
In my head I’m imaging Tim Duncan bopping to your music. Yeah, Tim has both my CDs. He’ll text me every blue moon saying he likes one of my songs. Tim’s not really a big rap guy, but if I need his support, he’ll definitely give it to me.
I assume Pop [Gregg Popovich] isn’t a big rap guy, either. I don’t know what kind of music Pop listens to, but I would never give him my CD.
Who else have you worked with, or who else do you want to work with? Well…I got Game, Jim Jones, Bun B, Alley Boy, several cats from my label. I got one of the hottest rappers out of Atlanta, Twin, on my album. I got Messiah, Pepa Spray, B-Lean, a lot of guys, Scarface, I got a song with Kevin Durant, Young Chris. I got everybody on that album. It’s going to be crazy.
So Durant’s kind of nice with it?
Yeah, KD can go, man. I respect him for even getting on the track with me, because a lot of athletes are scared to even get on the same song with me ’cause they feel I’m gonna embarrass them. I’m just happy he took the time to do it, and he really killed the verse so a lot of people are gonna be surprised by it.
You mentioned that KD is on the album. How do you kind of stay away from getting grouped in with all of the other NBA players who try their hand at rapping? A lot of people have this and that to say about players who make music, so how do you kind of stand alone on that?
I don’t care, I don’t pay attention to it, I’m me. Who cares what people say? I mean, people’s opinions are like buttholes—everybody has one. I don’t even pay it attention.
So on a scale of 1-10, how excited are you to hear this Kevin Durant/Stephen Jackson collab?
It just went final. Team USA repeats as gold medalists in a close, hard-fought game against Spain winning 107-100. Three of the basketball's best players (you can certainly argue they're the top 3) all came to play today. Durant led all scorers with 30 and LeBron had 19 with Kobe chipping in 17. Great game and congrats to Team USA!
Team USA dominated Australia tonight; winning their 2012 Olympic quarterfinal match, score 119-86. But that’s actually not what people are talking about because its Team USA, and we pretty much know they will win Olympic gold. Tonight was all about LeBron James! Did he score 20 points like Kobe Bryant? No. Did he even score 14 points like Kevin Durant? Absolutely not, but he did make USA basketball history by being the first player to ever have a triple double. King James stats were 11 points, 12 assists, and 14 rebounds.
Also look out for LeBron and the rest of the Miami Heat to repeat this season in the NBA championship. GO HEAT!
