The ‘Bus driver vs bus rider’ debate has become a big talking point in the NBA in recent years. And if anyone has suffered the most from it, it is Kevin Durant. The term bus driver in the NBA is a metaphor to indicate players who shoulder the responsibility of their team. Meanwhile, the term bus rider indicates role players on a team. However, it was not as if players before KD did not fear suffering a similar fate in terms of criticism. One of the most recent names that came forward is former Sacramento Kings star Chris Webber.

Spending his prime years in a good Sacramento franchise, Webber mentioned he could have tried to chase championships and jump on different teams. But he preferred losing to players like Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett (in Minnesota), and Karl Malone. “Because at that time it was, as Isiah Thomas calls it, the bus driver against the bus driver. So being the best player, if I lost to those guys, that was fine. Because my mentality was, if you go join them, you’re the weakest cat of them all,” Webber said on the Green Light podcast.

He further mentioned that teaming up with big names in the NBA to fulfill NBA championship aspirations would only have pacified the fans. The 5x All-Star feels contented with his career choices. “Cause my, at that time, it was me against them (the above names), our team against them, the leader against them,” he said.

During his 7-year stay in Sacramento, the Kings reached the Playoffs each time. In fact, they were arguably the best team in the West after the Los Angeles Lakers and the San Antonio Spurs. Despite reaching numerous Conference Semis and 1 Conference Finals, the Kings were never able to get one over Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal’s Lakers or Tim Duncan’s Spurs.

Notably, Webber won many awards and accolades but an NBA championship in his career. However, he never tried landing on a team that was already winning to give him a shot at securing a championship. And this was something Durant faced severe criticism for.

A look back on Kevin Durant’s bus driver controversy

The root cause of the terminology for Durant is his move from OKC to Golden State Warriors. Although he won two championships (2017 and 2018) with the team, the Warriors were already the best team in the league. They had won the 2015 NBA championship and ended next season with the best-ever regular season record (73-9) while beating Durant’s Thunder on the way to the Finals, which they eventually lost.

However, the criticism became severe after Charles Barkley in his analogy called Durant a ‘bus rider’, rather than a ‘bus driver’ back in 2022. “I don’t want to badmouth the dude… You guys always talk about that championship stuff. I try to tell y’all. All these bus riders. They don’t mean nothing to me. If you ain’t driving the bus, don’t walk around talking about you a champion,” he said on ‘Inside the NBA’ after his star-studded Brooklyn Nets got swept in the first round of the playoffs by the Boston Celtics.

The 2x NBA champ did not hold back either, as he called him a “hatin old head” in a post on X. He further alleged that Barkley cannot digest the fact that players now are making more than what his generation did. “It’s just timing Chucky, don’t hate the playa,” further read the post. While the experts have time and again clashed on this, the fans also stand divided in their opinion of the whole “bus driver” and “bus rider” logic. 

Stay tuned for more such updates. And to follow what Shaq’s ex-agent, Leonard Armato, has to say about the Reese-Clark rivalry and more, watch this video.