The Thunder All-Star is eligible to be dealt on February 4, but “sources close to the situation say the Thunder’s view on Westbrook is to see what he can do as the single focal point of the team and plan to keep the noise out of the equation until next summer”. 4 and 6 seed, respectively, in the Western Conference this season. His absence was felt more in the postseason when Portland swept the final four games of its series with the Clippers, with Griffin missing the last two games due to a quadriceps injury.
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Losing a franchise player who has been with your favorite team since the start of his/her career is a tough pill for any fan to swallow, but let’s not go insane and start renaming cities, Oklahoma.
It’s easy to jump to that conclusion that he’s giving a nod to Kevin Durant.
In a move that was surely inevitable, given the nature of a certain someone’s departure back in July (For those of you living under a rock, that certain someone is Kevin Durant), citizens* of the small town of Durant, Oklahoma are petitioning Governor Mary Fallin to change the town name to Westbrook, Oklahoma. He filed the petition at Change.org recently, and expressed his feelings.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the great state of Oklahoma has been betrayed”, Nazari wrote.
The fallout from Kevin Durant’s decision to sign as a free agent with the Warriors and leave the Thunder behind hasn’t gone over all that well with some Oklahoma City fans.
Kevin Durant is done with Oklahoma, so apparently some folks in the state want nothing to do with him – or even things that remind them of the National Basketball Association star.
“Yes, it is understood that the city Durant was not named after the evil Kevin Durant”, the petition acknowledges, “but it is just another ugly reminder of what happened to our community”.
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Durant, founded in 1873, is a city of around 15,000 people in southern Oklahoma. Apparently, the town’s name is pronounced differently (per The Oklahoman), as well, having its emphasis on the first syllable, as in “DOO-Rant”. Nazari wants to celebrate Thunder guard Russell Westbrook, the other half of the Thunders’ one-two punch, the half that signed a contract extension with the club.
