Kevin Durant turned 33 this week as he enters his 15th season in the NBA.

Durant says he is "more at ease" and relaxed mentally at this stage of his career as opposed to when he was younger.

"[When you are younger] you want to establish yourself in the league," Durant said Thursday after the Nets' practice at their training camp at the University of San Diego. "Sometimes you may overthink it and may think too much about reactions and opinions of others because you are on the journey to perfection. But start to relax a little bit and understand what this is about and understand the long game, and it definitely made my mental a little bit more at ease coming to the gym every day and not focusing on that stuff."

The Brooklyn Nets are widely considered the title favorites, but Durant says the pressure will not affect this veteran group.

"Yeah, outside pressure don't really matter much," Durant said when asked whether pressure is even an issue at this stage in his career. "I think we all internally put pressure on ourselves because we hold ourselves to a high standard and you want to play well every time you step out there; that is just who we are as competitors.

"As far as the outside noise, no disrespect for you guys [in the media], for our families, friends and even our fans expecting us to do so much -- if we don't live up to those, at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. But we want to come out and play a great brand of basketball every night and we hold ourselves to that standard. I expect us to come out there with some swagger and some intensity. But outside noise shouldn't matter much to this group."

When Kyrie Irving took a personal leave last January, the Houston Rockets inquired about the potential availability of him in James Harden trade talks.

Sources tell Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report that the Nets never entertained trading Irving.

Multiple executives across the league have speculated that a trade of Irving to the Philadelphia 76ers for Ben Simmons could solve each of their problems. Irving is currently unable to play home games with the Nets due to his position on not taking a COVID-19 vaccine, while Simmons has requested a trade and doesn't plan to report.

Several league sources with knowledge of the situation have strongly pushed back on the notion that either Irving or the Nets are interested in a trade. 

"Kyrie came to Brooklyn to win a championship alongside Kevin Durant," one veteran executive told Bleacher Report.

James Harden's camp, meanwhile, have communicated that they expect Irving to remain with the Nets.

The Nets have worked patiently behind closed doors with Irving during other incidents.

"I'm sure Sean Marks and Steve Nash aren't thrilled with the situation, but despite all the s--t that goes on, they still treat him really well there," one league source with knowledge of the situation said. "They hear him out. They make the effort to try and communicate with him. That's why Brooklyn is a special place."

James Harden explained why he's taking his time on making a decision on whether he will sign a contract extension with the Brooklyn Nets before the season starts. 

"You know, I think over the course of my career I've never been a free agent before, so I've always just been loyal and just signed it, you know, the contract extension," said Harden to Malika Andrews. "Just being there, being there, being there. I just want to take my time with it. It would be very, very difficult to leave here, or to even leave Kevin Durant or Kyrie Irving.

"But I think this season I just want to focus on winning the championship and everything else will work itself out.”

Harden also told the YES Network this week that he doesn't see himself anywhere else.

Harden previously turned down a two-year, $103 million extension with the Houston Rockets prior to his trade during the 20-21 season.

Harden could sign a three-year, $161.1 million extension on top of his 22-23 season, or also sign a five-year, $235 million deal during the 2022 offseason.

There project to be very few teams with cap space in 2022 and none currently enough to sign Harden to his current number.

Sean Marks previously indicated he was hopeful Brooklyn would sign both Harden and Kyrie Irving to extensions before the start of camp. 

League sources that spoke with Vincent Goodwill of Yahoo! Sports believe Kyrie Irving will eventually wind up taking the COVID-19 vaccine, citing influence from Kevin Durant.

“Please respect my privacy,” Irving said over Zoom when asked about the vaccine.

Current laws in New York City would prohibit unvaccinated players from playing in games.

Over 90 percent of NBA players are vaccinated.

James Harden and Kyrie Irving remain in discussions with the Brooklyn Nets on their respective contract extensions.

Both players said they are still weighing options and are not in a rush to make a decision.

"It's not about the money for me," Harden said. "I've been on enough teams where we fell short. So my mindset and my goal is to make sure we're able to build and continue to build this team to be able to compete as a team for multiple multiple years at the highest level. Win a championship in New York, the money will come."

Irving can add four seasons and up to $182 million, while Harden can add three years and up to $161 million.

Kevin Durant previously signed a four-year, $198 million extension in August.

A report from Matt Sullivan of Rolling Stone details the hesitancy of Kyrie Irving to get vaccinated. While the NBA and NBPA have not mandated vaccines for players, New York City's current vaccine rules would prohibit Irving from playing home games with the Brooklyn Nets.

“There are so many other players outside of him who are opting out, I would like to think they would make a way,” says Kyrie’s aunt, Tyki Irving, who runs the seven-time All-Star’s family foundation and is one of the few people in his regular circle of advisors. “It could be like every third game. So it still gives you a full season of being interactive and being on the court, but with the limitations that they’re, of course, oppressing upon you. There can be some sort of formula where the NBA and the players can come to some sort of agreement.”

Irving recently started following and liking Instagram posts from a conspiracy theorist who claims that “secret societies” are implanting vaccines in a plot to connect Black people to a master computer for “a plan of Satan.”

League protocols state that teams must submit a list of players and staff who aren’t vaccinated to their league testing officer.

Kyrie Irving has yet to receive a vaccination for COVID-19, multiple sources tell Yaron Weitzman of FoxSports.

The NBA, according to a league spokesman, believes that around 85% of its players are currently vaccinated; National Basketball Players Association Executive Director Michele Roberts put the number at 90% during a July interview with Yahoo Sports. Those numbers are about 10-to-15% more than the overall rate of American adults who are vaccinated.

Rules in New York City and San Francisco would prohibit members of the New York Knicks, Brooklyn Nets and Golden State Warriors from playing or practicing in their home arenas "without providing proof of at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccination unless they have an approved medical or religious exemption."

Sean Marks didn't mention Irving by name when he mentioned the Nets had multiple players who were not yet vaccinated. 

"Regarding if they could play today, I can't comment on who could play and so forth. There would obviously be a couple people missing from that picture," Marks said. "I won't get into who it is, but we feel confident in the following several days before camp everybody would be allowed to participate and so forth."

The Brooklyn Nets hope to sign James Harden and Kyrie Irving to extensions in the coming weeks. The Nets have already signed Kevin Durant to a four-year, $198 million extension this offseason. 

"We've had very positive conversations with both those guys and -- whether it's family members, people and so forth -- I think it always helps to do these things in person," Sean Marks said. "With this being summer, we're very cognizant of letting people have their own time away before we all get back into the swing of things here.

"We're looking forward to sitting down with them over the course of the next week, two weeks, and furthering those discussions."

Both Harden and Irving would become unrestricted free agents in 2022 should they not extend. 

"I haven't really looked at it as a distraction, per se," Marks said. "Those guys know exactly how we feel, and I think they've been vocal about wanting to be part of this and build this together.

"I think we've got an opportunity to hopefully build something special here for the foreseeable future. The fact that they want to collaborate, they want to come here together, they want to build this together. I look forward to those discussions with Steve [Nash] and myself and obviously ownership, who's been incredibly supportive through this whole thing, and with the players. Just like any decision, it's a partnership and it's a collaboration."

Sean Marks revealed that some members of the Brooklyn Nets would not be allowed to participate in a practice at this point due to New York City's vaccinate mandate. 

"Regarding if they could play today, I can't comment on who could play and so forth," Marks said Tuesday in the team's preseason news conference. "There would obviously be a couple people missing from that picture.

"I won't get into who it is, but we feel confident in the following several days before camp everybody would be allowed to participate and so forth."

When asked if he believed the issue would be resolved before regular-season games begin next month, Marks simply said, "Correct."

The Brooklyn Nets did not offer Isaia Cordinier the required tender to retain his draft rights. Cordinier will now become an NBA free agent.

The 6'5'' guard out of France was originally drafted by the Atlanta Hawks with the 44th pick in the 2016 NBA Draft. Cordinier's draft rights were traded to Brooklyn in 2018 in a trade that sent Jeremy Lin to the Hawks. Cordinier has played with both Atlanta (twice) and Brooklyn (once) at Las Vegas Summer League in recent seasons.

Since being drafted in 2016, Cordinier has continued to play in France for Antibes and Nanterre 92. In 2020-21, for Nanterre 92, Cordinier averaged 13.1 points, 5.0 rebounds and 3.6 assists over 47 games (all starts).

NBA teams are required to offer second round picks a contract tender in order to retain their draft rights. That tender must be for at least a one-season contract, which can be fully non-guaranteed. If a team fails to offer the required tender, the player's draft rights are renounced and they become an NBA free agent.