Nets Owner Hoping Kyrie Irving ‘Gets Vaxxed ASAP’

While the Brooklyn Nets continue to struggle in the opening weeks of the NBA season, they are looking for something to help get them out of the funk they’re currently stuck in.

Enter Kyrie Irving.

Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai hopes Kyrie Irving “gets vaccinated as soon as possible.”

“I don’t know,” Tsai said in a sit-down interview with ESPN when asked when he thinks Irving will play again. “Either he has to be vaccinated in order to come back if the New York mandate is still in place. And don’t ask me when they may or may not change the New York mandate. Again, if you ask the people that are making decisions at the city level, they are going to say we are going to rely on science, rely on what the health department tells us [in order to proceed].”

See more

In exclusive interview with Joe Tsai, Nets owner tells NetsDaily, “I have all the patience in the world with Kyrie. He’s on the roster, just not on the court.” Tsai said he’s had “multiple conversations” with Irving but he’s tried not to evangelize. Bottom line: Nothing new.

— NetsDaily (@NetsDaily) October 29, 2021

Tsai said he has not once spoken to Kyrie since the day they decided to rule him out if he doesn’t get vaxxed. That was on Oct. 12th.

“Last time [I] talked to him was when we made the decision that he was not going to be playing until something changes,” said Tsai, who owns the team with his wife, Clara Wu Tsai. “We haven’t communicated since then.”

See more

Joe Tsai tells ESPN he hopes Kyrie 'gets vaccinated as soon as possible,' how they haven't spoken since Nets decided to move forward until he's vaccinated, how he hopes Kyrie is still a part of Nets' long term and how protestors were 'hijacking the issue' https://t.co/AOzYAsuIRm

— Ohm Youngmisuk (@NotoriousOHM) October 29, 2021

Added Tsai: “Obviously Kyrie has his own belief so I respect that. But we have to make a team decision. This is not a decision about him. This is a decision about where we go as a team. And it is just not tenable for us to have a team with a player that comes in and out, no home games, only away games. What do you do in practice then?

“This week we have a whole stretch of six home games, so we won’t have Kyrie. So it became pretty clear to us. We are very much aligned among myself, [GM] Sean [Marks], coaching staff that this has to be [the decision], especially since we’re a team with pretty lofty aspirations. We don’t see any other way of running this team.”

There’s probably little to no chance Kyrie is going to get the vaccine.

At this point he’s so far down the rabbit hole, there’s probably no coming back. We may just have to wait until the Pandemic ends before we see Kyrie on the court again.

---

Welcome to the game outside the game! Follow us on our Sideaction Twitter handle, Instagram, and Facebook for the latest on sports and pop culture news across the web!