With Irving not permitted to play in home games, Nets owner Joe Tsai, general manager Sean Marks, and head coach Steve Nash decided at the start of the season that Irving would not practice with the team nor play in road games until he could be a full-time player.
In mid-October, Irving took to Instagram Live for a 20-minute session, explaining why he chose to remain unvaccinated, hinting that the league previously promised him a vaccine exemption.
“What would you do if you felt uncomfortable going into the season when you were promised that you would have exemptions or that you didn’t have to be forced to get the vaccine?” Irving said. “This wasn’t an issue before the season started.”
While Irving explained that he had no intentions of retiring (a rumor that had been floating around), he also made it clear that he was going to continue to do what he felt was best.
“I’m always going to stay true to me, and that’s me. This is my life. I get to do whatever I want with this,” Irving said. “This is one body that I get here, one God body that I get here, and you’re telling me what to do with my body. … I’m a human being. I have emotions, I have feelings, I have thoughts, things that I keep to myself, things that I share, but I’m staying grounded in what I believe in. It’s just as simple as that."
But as Kevin Durant and James Harden began to take on huge workloads and the Nets' roster became riddled with COVID cases, the Nets announced on Dec. 17 that Irving would be back with the team and play in road games only.
It was certainly not the start to the season that the Nets or Irving had in mind, but now the All-Star guard is back in the fold, and Brooklyn's championship hopes remain as strong as ever.
