Kevin Durant Reflects on Best Teams: Warriors vs. Nets

Kevin Durant walked himself right back into the Golden State conversation he’d tried to sidestep.

In a new Boardroom interview, Durant was asked a simple question with a loaded history: What’s the best team, on paper, he’s ever played on?

His first instinct wasn’t the Golden State Warriors. It was the Brooklyn Nets.

Durant laid out his case. He rattled off the names: Kyrie Irving, James Harden, Blake Griffin, LaMarcus Aldridge, Paul Millsap, Patty Mills. Former All-Stars, decorated veterans, big reputations.

“We had the names on that team,” Durant said, pointing to the sheer volume of résumés in that Brooklyn locker room. In his mind, that collection of careers and accolades was “tough to beat.”

Then came the part that always stings a little in the Bay.

Durant explained why he didn’t initially put his Warriors teams in that same “on paper” category. Yes, there was Stephen Curry. Yes, there was Klay Thompson. Yes, there was Draymond Green. But he framed those years through the lens of accolades at the time, not what those players eventually became.

“I know people are going to say, ‘the Warriors, you had Steph and Klay.’ But I’m like, when you look at that team, though. At the time, Steph was an MVP but Klay and Draymond didn’t get the accolades at that time. They were like one-time All-Stars.”

The Brooklyn group, he argued, was different. Those Nets names had already built out their legacies.

“These [Nets players] I’m talking about already completed their careers, damn near, and got all of their accolades on top of me, James and Kyrie. So when you’re just putting accolades on the table, I would say that team.”

It echoed a point he’d made earlier this offseason, when he said the 2026 Philadelphia 76ers were more talented on paper than his title-winning Warriors squads. That comparison reportedly didn’t sit well with Klay Thompson. This latest answer sounded like another jab.

Then Durant paused. Reflected. And changed his mind.

The more he thought about it, the more one specific Warriors season pushed its way back into focus.

“Obviously, the best team I played on was the Warriors,” Durant admitted. “I want to say the 2019 team was crazy, but we got hurt. With Cousins at the five, that’s probably the best team I’ve been a part of on paper.”

Just like that, the narrative flipped. The same franchise he’d just left out of his initial answer reclaimed top spot in his own hierarchy.

The key detail he’d overlooked? DeMarcus Cousins.

Durant said that 2018-19 group didn’t immediately come to mind because Cousins missed so much time with injury. The two stars simply didn’t share the floor enough for that version of the Warriors to live front and center in his memory.

“I forgot about Cuz. I didn’t play with Cuz a lot that year, because he got hurt. But when you look at it on paper, it’s probably, yeah,” Durant said, before quickly adding, “That Brooklyn team is a close second.”

It’s a revealing distinction. Durant isn’t talking about chemistry, fit, or what actually happened in June. He’s talking about the raw talent sheet: Curry, Thompson, Durant, Green, Cousins — five players who, at various points in their careers, sat near the top of their positions.

In reality, that 2019 Warriors team never got to prove what it could be at full strength. Cousins tore his quad in the first round. Durant ruptured his Achilles in the Finals. Klay Thompson tore his ACL in Game 6. A superteam on paper turned into a medical report.

Brooklyn, of course, followed a similar script. Durant, Irving and Harden shared the floor far less than expected. The “names on that team” never translated into the dynasty many projected.

Durant admitted one lingering regret from that era: not finishing the job with the Nets. He said he knew what a championship in Brooklyn would have felt like, how electric that atmosphere would have been if they’d actually pulled it off. It never happened.

So his personal rankings now read like this: Warriors 2019 at No. 1 on paper, Nets close behind, with the earlier Warriors title teams judged a bit differently — less by accolades, more by what they actually did.

The rings, of course, still sit in Golden State. The what-ifs remain in Brooklyn.