BOSTON, MA—“Basketballs are also flat,” Celtics star Kyrie Irving proclaimed in a postgame locker-room interview Wednesday. “Nobody’s ever seen the other side of a basketball, so how are we supposed to know it’s round?”
“And before you ask, I don’t want to hear any of that ‘If it’s flat how do you play basketball with it bull-shit. If an overweight young professional can toss a frisbee into a basket, why shouldn’t a top-level athlete such as myself be able to complete a similar task,” Irving asked. “I won’t be taking questions at this time. Thanks so much for coming out. It really means a lot.”
Teammate Aron Baynes echoed Irving’s sentiment. “When I was a kid, I used to always get the ‘Round Balls’ catalog in the mail and the balls looked pretty round in the pictures, but when I finally put together the money and ordered a basketball, it arrived and it was much less round than I had anticipated. I guess sometimes being disappointed is a part of growing up.”
Other teammates expressed reservations about Irving’s convictions but proved too afraid to confront the star. “I made fun of him for being a vegan once and he threw a bowl of roasted jackfruit at me. I cried and now he only refers to me as ‘Baby Al,’ so no way I’m ever mentioning flat balls to his face,” teammate Al Horford said.
At press time, Irving was “royally pissed” after a reporter asked if soccer balls are also flat, asking how “one might kick a flat ball.”
— H. Rubin