Just one game into the NBA season, Golden State Warriors forward Kevin Durant used the slights against him for motivation.

ESPN’s Ethan Sherwood Strauss was on the scene Thursday night in New Orleans as Durant participated in a post-practice shooting session before Friday’s game against the Pelicans.

Durant spent some of that time yelling criticisms at himself:

“They say I ain’t hungry!”

“I’m out here!”

Shooting his last shots, Durant said, “They told me I ain’t have no drive! I’m out here. They called me a coward! Putting in work.”

When asked after his session about shouting criticisms, Durant explained, “That’s what I say to myself when I’m working. I hear it all the time. You hear the noise. You hear what they say about you. Everybody hears it. So it’s a little extra motivation when you hear it.” …

“It’s not that I read it — it’s just in the air,” he said. “You know it’s just in the atmosphere and people tell you and you hear about it. You guys ask me questions about it all the time, so obviously I know, but I’m not losing sleep on it. It’s just wood on that fire.”

Durant ended the session with this: “It’s one game of 82 and you [expletive] guys make me feel like the world’s going to end.”

Couple that with his recent admission he’s “lurked here and there” on Reddit, and it reveals a Durant who doesn’t just ignore what’s said about him — looks like he files it away and brings it out when he needs a boost.

It’s a fascinating little look into the psyche of someone who’s probably heard it all this offseason.

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