In a surprise to no one, the big winner from the Kevin Durant-Bucketscenter Instagram beef is the 18-year-old kid who successfully goaded the two-time NBA champion with a post that claimed he doesn’t elevate his team like LeBron or Stephen Curry.
It took months of tagging Durant in garbage IG posts, but Kalyb Champion, a “bold and controversial teenage basketball analyst,” has cashed in with new followers and plenty of press after this sparring session, and he kept the momentum going Monday with an article on The Guardian.
The aspiring journalist behind Bucketscenter says he didn’t like the way KD came at him with personal attacks, but harbors no ill will. He also revealed the two made up after the back and forth (via The Guardian):
I don’t have any negative feelings towards Durant though. I appreciate that he acknowledged what I had to say, but didn’t like the way he went about taking personal shots at me. I realize that I’m not a professional athlete and don’t pretend I can do half the stuff a player like Durant can. I come at it from the perspective of a younger fan trying to jump-start a career in journalism. It was simply another day of me doing what I love and sharing my opinion with people who seem to really care.
Later in the week Durant reached out to me in my DMs about the situation. The attention I got from the story has helped raise my profile and he said he’s glad I got it. I also apologized for any offense he took from my comments and he did the same towards me. We then had a casual conversation about basketball, and I was able to pick the brain of one of the greatest talents in the sport. I will never forget the experience and I realize all the opportunities this opens for my basketball analysis career moving forward.
Remember the name Kalyb Champion. You might see him feuding with Skip Bayless’ corpse in 10 years on “Undisputed.”
