Cleveland Cavaliers: What exactly does Kyrie Irving want?

With seemingly everything going right for him with the Cleveland Cavaliers, we explore what exactly Kyrie Irving’s end game is with the trade demand

From the outside looking in, Kyrie Irving has it all. He’s an NBA champion at the age of 25; perennial All-Star; Olympian; and a menace in clutch situations or just finding a shot for himself.

What could the issue be? He’s playing in a conference where it’s been the Cleveland Cavaliers and everyone else. Irving plays with one of the games greatest players, but has decided to request a trade from “The Land.”

According to ESPN’s Brian Windhorst, Irving wants to become the main guy on a team again. A role he prominently held his first three seasons in the league. Until the abrupt arrivals of LeBron James and Kevin Love, which turned the Cavaliers from fringe-worthy playoff contenders to championship contenders in over a month. Irving never asked to become a winner so early in his career. It just happened.

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Irving was quickly rising among the NBA ranks without the pressure of success or looming possibility of departure, because he won early. The arrival of James and Love prevented Irving from going through tough seasons when it comes to wins and losses such as Anthony Davis and DeMarcus Cousins. Irving has it all, but wants more.

The wanting more past is confusing when it comes to Irving. He averaged career-highs in points (25.2), field-goal attempts (19.7), field-goal percentage (.473) and usage percentage (30.8). Last season, from a statistical point of view, was the best of his career thus far, which also included a 23.0 player efficiency rating. But yet, Irving wants out.

Irving wants to become the alpha like his mentor, Kobe Bryant, did once Shaquille O’Neal departed from the Lakers. Like Bryant, Irving wants to prove what he can do as the main guy on a team. The question is why? He’s putting up stats like an alpha, even in a season where James attempted the third lowest amount of shots (18.2) in his career while posting the third lowest usage percentage (30.0) of his career.

Despite James regressing his play on the court, sort of, both him and Irving had their best season as a duo in their third year together.

Both got their numbers, with of course James being the top guy. Irving averaged alpha dog numbers playing a secondary role most of the time, even though he did carry the team at points. Games 5, 6 and 7 in the 2016 Finals. Then, there’s the 2017 playoffs where he played games possessed going on offensive binges.

Game 4 against Boston and Games 3 and 4 against Golden State. When he wants to, he’s an offensive machine and can win games by himself.

But then the argument will arise: did his scoring ability become more of a threat because of James and his surrounding parts? For sure. But scoring is scoring, and Irving has decide to do it elsewhere, interestingly enough. His trade request comes at an interesting time where it leaked 21 days into free agency.

There are conflicting reports on when exactly the request happened. ESPN’s Ian Begley reported Irving wanted to be traded as early as draft night to the Chicago Bulls. His interest faded away once Jimmy Butler was felt to the Minnesota Timberwolves. The draft was June 22nd and the NBA Finals concluded on June 12th. In between that 10-day span, going with Begley’s report, Irving wanted to be dealt.

Not going against Begley’s report, but if accurate could be heave wanted to be dealt since the regular season? Ten days after being the championship round is a quick time spans to declare a trade request, but things in the NBA do happen.

On the other side of Irving’s request is Windhorst reporting the star guard made it known to Cleveland he wanted out as of last week. Which would make more sense as the time did begin flirting with the idea of signing Derrick Rose very recently.

When the talk officially began is unknown until Irving is or isn’t traded and he talks about it. The reported reasons of him wanting out don’t make much sense from the outside looking in, and maybe there’s more to it? Could it be an issue with James? Back in 2014, Chris Bosh relayed it would be “extremely frustrating” for Love to adapt to Love, similar to how he had to. Long behold and it was, with James having an air-it-out meeting with Love.

Bosh, Love and now Irving have had their struggles with James. Maybe it’s an internal thing that’s been put to the side due to winning, because it does heal most wounds. The outside public won’t really know what’s been going until someone speaks on it or a book is made. Until then, it’s purely speculation.

Irving’s confidence isn’t anything short. He’s not scared of the moment, and like Bryant, it looks like Irving wants to see what he can do as an evolved player on a team led by him. Might not be a slight at James, just a personal mission to become more great and levitate his cache in the NBA. Windhorst’s piece also mentions Irving considered requesting a trade after last seasons championship, but thought against it – just two years into a quest to win championships.

As the days go on, it’ll become more glaring in which Irving wants to create his own Mamba moments.

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Just how Bryant was obsessed with becoming Michael Jordan, is Irving too obsessed trying to become Bryant? He’s established a safety net with James and Love, and is willing to give that up for personal reasons. Again, his situation with the Cleveland Cavaliers might be as good as it gets and he might not see what James sees when it comes to winning.