Dissed.

The latest non-story broiling at NewsOK.com is the perceived slight against Kevin Durant by whoever schedules the NBA's nationally televised games. The Thunder has (have?) only one nationally televised appearance this year, on ESPN. Three if you count NBATV games as "nationally televised", and apparently some of them do. But either way, this is an appalling lack of national exposure for one of the league's marquee franchises and for one of its most prominent stars. The only possible explanation is this: KD is being disrespected on a massive scale.

If you weren't aware, some say Kevin Durant is as good as, and possibly (probably?) better than, LeBron James. This debate has been gaining steam lately and there doesn't seem to be anyone who can answer it definitively. Yet the Cavs have 25 nationally televised games this year to the Thundermen's one. NO. FAIR. All I know is: the LeBrons went to the second round in his third year and Kevin Durant is the greatest player of all time to have never won more than 23 games in a season. So look out league, the Oklahoman's turning this fairly obvious, routine business decision into locker room fodder. It's like, what have you done for me lately, NBA? Don't you read blogs? We're cult faves over here. We're the Boondock Saints of the NBA. Your friends tell you that you totally have to see this movie, then you do, and it fucking sucks like nothing you've ever seen. What I'm saying is you should at least release our games on DVD box set.

So if the league is sitting on the current LeBron James in OKC, why won't they show the world? While it's probably a league-wide conspiracy, it might also be because of this report by Sports Business Journal, who compiled the local TV ratings from NBA markets over the course of last season. Apparently they can do that.

"Another disappointment came in Oklahoma City, where an average of just 8,000 homes watched Thunder games on Fox Sports Oklahoma, even though this season was the team’s first in the market."

Disappointment? Don't you mean "unqualified success"?

Yes, Kevin Durant was only seen by an average of 8,000 households per game, the second-worst figure in the NBA. The former LeBron drew 134,000 households on average locally. I find this statistic interesting because every time you go to a Thunder game, you are literally looking at a majority of Thunder fans in existence. It would seem that if anyone were disrespecting Kevin Durant it's Oklahoma City, which is an idea so patently absurd it makes me want to laugh out loud and then swallow hard and get very quiet. Durant has even inspired his own extremely FD t-shirt with his face on a milk carton:
But Durant is a Nike man, and the new LeBron, so something like this might be more appropriate: