According to Chris Mannix of Sports Illustrated, Kyrie Irving will miss the Nets upcoming three-game road trip citing a shoulder injury. The injury comes at an inconvenient time for NBA fans who were anticipating Irving's return to his former team, the Boston Celtics. Former Celtics big-man Kendrick Perkins thinks Irving is exaggerating the injury to avoid Boston.
"Kyrie looked at the schedule before the season started and planned this whole injury thing because he didn’t want to go back to Boston this upcoming week!!! He didn’t want that smoke in the Bean Town. Smh," he wrote on Twitter last night. Fans in the replies echoed Perkins opinion with one writing, "The Nets next week go to the Knicks, Cavs and Celtics. All of a sudden Kyrie is hurt the week before he would have to face the three fan bases who hate him."
Perkins went in further on a Boston sports talk radio station on Thursday according to Complex saying, "It's just something with him. He's showing us who he is. All of a sudden, two weeks before he has to return to Boston he's injured. Sounds like a setup plan to me... This probably was pre-rehearsed from the jump. He didn't want to come back and face this. We're looking at a guy who's mentally weak."
The Nets take on the Celtics on Wednesday at 7:00 pm.