Guarding Kevin Durant is an impossible thing to do. It is especially so during the playoffs when he’s more locked in than normal.
But somebody has to do it. And that somebody for the Milwaukee Bucks during their championship run was PJ Tucker. They traded for him, specifically, for this reason.
And, of course, Tucker didn’t really phase Durant too much during their matchup. Durant still averaged 35.4 points per game in the series on pretty good efficiency.
But the thing was…Tucker made him work for those buckets. He never got discouraged about it.
He’s a member of the Miami Heat now, but Tucker described what it was like guarding KD on JJ Redick’s “The Old Man and the three” podcast.
And, after you hear how he approached it, you’ll want to line up with this dude for anything.
This 40 second clip makes me want to run through 100 brick walls pic.twitter.com/ni26VxeId3
— Jason Gallagher (@jga41agher) October 29, 2021
“It’s like, OK. Aw man, that was incredible. You made that. Now do it again. Now do it again. Because I’m not going to stop. I’m not going to stop. He’s like ‘stop hacking me,’ and I’m like ‘I’m not going to stop.’ We got face to face. I’m not going anywhere.”
Yoooooo. That’s insane, man. Most people run from that battle that they’re clearly losing. PJ Tucker just kept getting back up and running to it.
It had NBA fans everywhere wanting to run through walls for Tucker.