KD, Kyrie open up about their mutual respect for each other

Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving say it was a shared respect for one another that led to them becoming teammates on the Brooklyn Nets.

The pair spoke about their relationship and several other topics on Durant's new podcast "The Etcs with Kevin Durant," which premiered its first episode Tuesday.

"I felt the relationship grew just off of straight up respect before we even started having conversations," Durant said. "It was just a respect for who he is as a man and that mutual respect for how we came up as men and our journeys to this point. And then once we started to kick it and talk about what we like to do outside of the game and our families started to meet, it just became easy, you know?

"Obviously the common ground is how we hoop and how we love the game of basketball, but it just branched off from there."

Irving went on to explain how he and Durant are constantly pushing each on the court and in other areas of their lives.

"I think I've always wanted that as just having somebody to push me at all times, whether it be we're off on the court talking about entrepreneurship or business and what we wanna do as partners or collaborations or designs," Irving said. "And then on the court, 'Yo, what do you think about this, bro?' He asked me questions about things I'm thinking because I know he studied as much of me as I've studied of him. So I think, bring that together it's like we want to see the level we can get to now sharing it with a person that we believe in, as well as other people, but it started with us being at the foundation."

Durant will get his first opportunity to play with Irving in Brooklyn next season after missing the entire 2019-20 campaign due to a ruptured Achilles tendon.