Much has changed in the NBA since Kevin Durant first entered the league as a 19-year-old in 2007. A lot has changed for Durant, now 36, who is entering his eighteenth season on his fifth team following an offseason trade to the Houston Rockets.
During that period, Durant and business partner Rich Kleiman have built out one of the most dynamic investment portfolios across sports, investing in everything from leagues and media companies to bitcoin and television and film projects.
So, what’s Durant’s advice to young players in the NBA who want to follow in his footsteps?
“Build your game up to be the best you can be, and once you get on that platform of the NBA Finals, the playoffs and it’s five, six million people watching every other night, that’s when you be who you are,” Durant told CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin at CNBC Sport and Boardroom’s Game Plan conference on Tuesday.
“Don’t try to change your personality. Don’t try too hard. Just be exactly who you are, showcase your game, and then people are going to gravitate towards you,” Durant said.
That approach has worked for Durant, the two-time NBA champion and four-time Olympic gold medalist who ranks among the league’s greatest scorers of all time.
“I was catering to the basketball community, and that is just going out there and playing my game,” Durant said. “I just felt like my game speaks for itself … I always felt like the NBA platform, which is full of billions of people and the second-most watched sport in the world, I felt like that’s all I needed.”
Durant said that the platform the NBA as a league provides is “probably why I was so confident in moving around the league, so much that I feel like I can do this anywhere.”
With Houston as the sixth city he’s played in (he was part of the Seattle Supersonics team that relocated to Oklahoma City), Durant and Kleiman said each have presented different opportunities, but that has not been at the center of the decision-making process.
“We weren’t sitting there in June going what business is there for us in Houston, as opposed to what business there would be for us in Miami,” Kleiman said.
Instead, Kleiman said, the two focus on building relationships, which can survive the shifts that come with professional sports. “There’s value in me getting to know [Houston Rockets owner] Tilman [Fertitta] and Patrick [Fertitta] and seeing what those relationships can be, just like I still have a relationship with [Brooklyn Nets owner] Joe Tsai and [Golden State Warriors owner] Joe Lacob.”
Kleiman said that Durant’s approach to showing up and delivering has translated into the business world, something that the pair took into account when meeting with companies and people in the Bay Area during his time with the Warriors, and continues to do.
“I think what Kevin has been able to do is show that there’s a different blueprint you can take, that less can be more, and that your game can speak for itself,” he said.
As for what’s next, Durant said he is aiming to play in the 2028 Olympics, but that he doesn’t “want the gift of the veteran, like come sit on the end of the bench and get you a fifth [gold medal].”
Could that future include NBA team ownership? Durant, who already owns stakes in MLS’s Philadelphia Union and a pickleball team, said the answer is “of course,” but also acknowledged how rising valuations make it “easier said than done.”
But Kleiman noted how Durant’s approach to relationships and partnerships throughout his career would lend itself well to NBA ownership.
“As private equity is diversifying these cap tables, as some of these billionaires are buying teams and the valuations are so high, you need to bring added value and strategic value to these organizations, expertise, and the ability to generate revenue in a multitude of ways,” he said. “If you’re trying to build the team you’re not going to get much better than having someone like Kevin if you’re talking about building a brand and understanding how to build community.”
