KD, Kyrie collaborating on sneaker

After years of putting out their own signature shoes, Brooklyn Nets stars Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving are working on a sneaker together.

Nike footwear designer Benjamin Nethongkome, who worked with Irving on the Kyrie 7 sneaker, spoke about the collaboration in an interview with Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News. Nethongkome explained that Irving called Durant after first seeing Irving's new shoe, which led to talk of them designing something together.

"(Kyrie) was like, 'Look at this heat I have in my hand,'" Nethongkome said. "And there was some friendly competitiveness to them too, like, 'Whose shoe is better?' ...

"It kind of spawned into, 'Wouldn't it be cool if we collaborated on something together in the near future?' And right then and there, KD was like, 'Of course.' So we're excited to have some level of interaction between those two in terms of product creation in the near future."

Irving recently said he appreciates having someone like Durant around to constantly push him.

"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 on "The Etcs with Kevin Durant" podcast. "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."