4 most irritating and frustrating players in the NBA
Tim Duncan is revered for being many things - basketball expert, team leader, a quiet and polite personality. In his own way, he was like the teachers' favorite student - unassuming, ready to do whatever Coach Pop told him to do, and always calm under stress or provocation. That's especially impressive considering he had people like Kevin Garnett and Gary Payton talking him down on the court.
That last part cannot be stressed enough.
The NBA has always been home to drama and controversy. Even the off-season has news, as Bobby Portis proved last year when he landed his own teammate in the hospital with a couple of punches.
Usually the drama behind the scenes is the spiciest, such as Chicago Bulls' players going all-in on a mutiny less than a week after their new coach took charge, or the infamous Jimmy Butler practice at Target Center, where Butler said he took only one shot.
Some of the best rivalries and most intriguing bad blood start through trash talking and provocations, and that is unlikely to change no matter how strict the NBA referees become.
Here are the best trash talkers of the league, in no particular order:
1) Jimmy Butler
He falls under that tremendously popular I-will-trash-you-in-talk-AND-on-the-court-as-well, which was popularized by icons such as Jordan, Kobe and Garnett.
When I first read the news surrounding that practice, I couldn't believe it. I thought maybe it was an Onion article.
But no, it was true: after roundly insulting all the starters on the Timberwolves roster, Butler took them to school with the third stringers of that team, and beat the starters. Karl Anthony Towns, the glorified unicorn of the future, refused to post him up and passed the ball. Andrew Wiggins was so thoroughly cowed that he spent the next 11 games looking like he didn't know how to score.
Butler has since (i.e. because of that behaviour) been traded to the Sixers, a team with multiple volatile personalities like Simmons and Troll God Joel Embiid. He hasn't stopped his talk, saying it's all good and natural for a competitor like him.
(The man hasn't gotten out of the first round of the playoffs. Not even once. You have to wonder how high his ceiling is and whether he hasn't already passed it.)
He even said Blake Griffin couldn't score on him, which considering Griffin's current form is an invite for a nice, old school clash between them.
I like Butler. I hope he hangs around in Philly long enough to finally talk some sense into Simmons about getting that jumper on point.
Honorable mentions: Draymond Green, Joel Embiid.