{"id":860547,"date":"2026-08-19T07:18:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T07:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/860547\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T07:18:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T07:18:10","slug":"patrick-beverley-lakers-nba-media-forced-russell-westbrook-into-an-early-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/860547\/","title":{"rendered":"Patrick Beverley: Lakers, NBA Media Forced Russell Westbrook Into An Early Retirement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russell Westbrook<\/a> announced his retirement from the NBA<\/a> despite offers from multiple teams<\/a> to continue playing. Patrick Beverley<\/a>, his former teammate from the Lakers<\/a>, blames the NBA media and their former team for forcing his hand with consistent criticism<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Beverley recorded an episode of his podcast in which he spoke at length about his feelings on Westbrook\u2019s career and how it ended.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like he had a lot of game left. I feel like he played really well last season. I think the media killed his game. I\u2019m going to be honest. I think the media is so strong that it allowed fans to call him names. It allowed fans to have opinions about his game, which also forced team owners, GMs, and presidents to look at him a certain way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you talk about guards that\u2019s in the NBA and it\u2019s right and it\u2019s no disrespect to to guys that\u2019s on current teams but when you talk about you see Lonnie Walker you talk about Lonnie Walker and I it\u2019s no disrespect to Lonnie Walker he\u2019s a good friend of mine but if he can make an NBA team Russell Westbrook can make an NBA team without a doubt,\u201d Beverley said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re talking about 20 and 20 cuz heavy on the dubs heavy on the couses straight up shout out to Russell Westbrook, gone too early vibe I\u2019m going to be honest, you feel me? Legend. Legend.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I think it all turned when, you know, I said this before and I\u2019m going to be honest. I think it all turned when he went to the Lakers and left. I think he had a dark cloud over his head.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beverley has been consistent over the years about his feelings that joining the Lakers was the turning point in Westbrook\u2019s career<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cTeams didn\u2019t know if he was a team player. Teams didn\u2019t know if he was a good locker room guy. I mean, he was a teammate of mine. One of my favorite teammates. You talking about sacrificing the MVP?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMind you, me and him got beef. They started me, got him coming off the bench. I can laugh about it now cuz it\u2019s partly entertaining, but they got Russ coming off the bench and got Pat Bev starting in front of him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo like, and he still kept it core. He still was professional. He still like came in and did everything right. Every team dinner, every on time, everything stretched with the team. He did everything correct, man. He did everything correct,\u201d the former Lakers player further added.<\/p>\n

\u201cBittersweet to me cuz I\u2019mma keep it a buck. Bittersweet to me. Shout out to Russ. Shout out to the triple-double king. Like, giving flowers is a must. So, salute to you, bro.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, I\u2019m just mentioning all the on-the-court stuff, right? I\u2019m not even mentioning, \u2018Hey yo, Pat. Yeah, go to my car lot if you need a car.\u2019 \u2018Hey yo, Pat. Yeah. \u2018Honor the gift\u2019, your clothing line, if you want to come down here in LA and get you some clothes for you and the homies.\u2019 Like, I ain\u2019t even mentioning none of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI ain\u2019t even mentioning giving back to communities, making LA great again. I\u2019m not even mentioning none of that. I\u2019m just strictly on basketball. But with that and basketball, shout out to you, Russ. You deserve it all, bro. I hate to see you go so early. I know you got a ton of game left in you. A ton of game. Love always, gang. Love, love, love,\u201d Beverley concluded.<\/p>\n

The Sacramento Kings<\/a> and the Washington Wizards<\/a> wanted to sign the 37-year-old, but he decided to walk away from the game on his own terms. Both teams offered him a reduced role behind younger players like Darius Acuff Jr., which apparently led him to balk at the offers<\/a> and choose retirement.<\/p>\n

Westbrook ended his career averaging 20.9 points, 8.0 assists, and 6.9 rebounds while shooting 43.8% from the field. Even after his retirement, media figures like Skip Bayless continue to argue that he doesn\u2019t deserve Hall of Fame recognition<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So it is no wonder that while Draymond Green blames fans<\/a>, Beverley thinks the NBA media and the Lakers are more responsible<\/a> for Westbrook\u2019s decision to retire.<\/p>\n

It seems that Westbrook still has career opportunities in other leagues<\/a>, but for now the 37-year-old is still contemplating what\u2019s next. It will be very fascinating to see if Westbrook still contributes to the basketball world after his retirement or if he plans to stay under the radar like some retired legends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russell Westbrook announced his retirement from the NBA despite offers from multiple teams to continue playing. Patrick Beverley,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":860548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":["post-860547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=860547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/860548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=860547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=860547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=860547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}