Former #1 NBA Draft pick Kyrie Irving has had quite the roller coaster ride over the past 2 seasons since finishing his vaunted HS career at the famous St. Patrick’s HS in New Jersey. After somehow emerging from the shadows of playing alongside several fellow highly touted HS teammates at St. Pat’s like UNC’s Dexter Strickland, Kentucky alum Michael-Kidd Gilchrist, and once promising Kansas forward Quintrell Thomas, now at UNLV, Irving has arguably emerged as the best player in recent years to come out of the perennial hoops powerhouse.
But even as he now famously burst onto the scene in his lone season at Duke in late 2010, there has been a stigma attached to Irving that he is injury prone, a fact made more clear by the fact that Kyrie played in only 11 games, albeit of the spectacular variety, in his freshman season with the Blue Devils. Even though the mysterious foot injury was deemed potentially serious, the Cavaliers took a chance in a mediocre 2011 Draft Class by selecting Irving with the top pick, a wise choice considering Irving averaged an impressive 18.5 ppg, 5.4 ast, and 3.7 rebounds, earning the 2011 NBA Rookie of the Year award.
Because of his outstanding rookie season last year, USA Basketball even selected Irving as part of the USA Select Team to participate in scrimmages against the Sr National Team consisting of Lebron, Kobe, and Melo, with Irving drawing rave reviews for his play on both sides of the ball against point guards Deron Williams, Chris Paul, and Russell Westbrook.
During this offseason, Kyrie has become a mega-star, even starring in a commercial for Pepsi Max as Uncle Drew, punking some streetballers in his native New Jersey. There’s no doubt that the sky is the limit for Irving and the Cavs, as he is one of the NBA’s good guys and future stars of the NBA.
At Team USA Training Camp a few days ago, Kyrie rather shrewdly challenged future NBA Hall of famer Kobe Bryant to a game of 1-on-1, with the loser paying $50,000 to the winner’s favorite charity. After some fun trash talking where Kobe constantly raminds Kyrie that he’s still a baby baller still fresh out of high school, Kobe takes the reigning ROY up on his offer.
But it appears that the charity battle will have to wait a bit as word is that Kyrie has sustained a broken hand after slapping the foam padding when committing a turnover while practicing with his new teammates in the Las Vegas Summer League over the weekend. Last season, Kyrie missed 14 games due to a shoulder injury and a concussion. No doubt, those injury concerns may start to creep back into Irving’s reputation once again…….
Check out Kyrie Irving challenging Kobe 1-on-1:
Allen Moll has been a lifelong NBA and NCAA College Basketball fan who watches and studies games religiously, and coaches youth basketball in his native Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. Allen has also provided content to Bleacherreport.com, Upperdeckblog.com, Cleveland.com, CSN Philly.com, Buckets Magazine, in addition to being a tenured NBA and NCAA columnist for TheHoopDoctors.com.
