This past September at the Shooting Touch Conference in Boston, MA (a conference for young professionals trying to break into the 
sports world) Thunder GM Sam Presti was posed the following question: “How did you establish the culture in Oklahoma City?”
His response?
“Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook.”
The crowd laughed at the response (and so did Presti), but he then went on and said, “It’s true. Their work ethics are unbelievable…”
Obviously, the culture in Oklahoma City isn’t the way it is just because of KD and RW… But I’d be willing to bet a lot of money that there’s a lot of truth in that statement.
The logic behind this column is to get you to think: WHY does the media relentlessly bash Russell Westbrook? WHY don’t they go after Kevin Durant and say he needs to take control of the game more?
The answer is simple: It’s because it’s the easy thing to do. It’s easy to say ‘Westbrook should have passed more. How is this guy shooting so much with Kevin Durant beside him?’
Talk of this nature also draws eyeballs. People love to place blame on players without fully understanding their situations.