Kent Bazemore is the saddest man in sports after Warriors reach NBA Finals

Kent Bazemore joking tweeted that he’s “sick” after watching the Golden State Warriors make the NBA Finals after he left.

The Golden State Warriors are heading to the NBA Finals for the sixth time in the past eight seasons after defeating the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference Finals in five games. Now, they await the winner of the Boston Celtics-Miami Heat series.

Congratulatory tweets to the Warriors were flowing in, including from former player and current Los Angeles Laker Kent Bazemore. While he congratulated his former Warriors teammates, Bazemore jokingly tweeted that he’s “sick” after the team made the NBA Finals the year after he left.

Kent Bazemore jokingly tweets he’s ‘sick’ after watching Warriors make NBA Finals year after he leaves

After the 2020-21 season, Bazemore entered free agency and signed a one-year, $2.4 million contract with the Lakers. As the Bleacher Report tweet above alludes to, The Athletic’s Shams Charania reported that Bazemore turned down a two-year contract worth more money from the Warriors, as he felt he would have a bigger role with the Lakers and have a shot to win the NBA Championship.

The Lakers failed to make it to the play-in round, let alone the playoffs, as they finished 11th in the Western Conference.

Bazemore averaged 3.4 points and 1.8 points while recording a field-goal percentage of 32.4 through 39 games (14 starts).

This is not the first time that Bazemore’s departure resulted in a Finals berth for the Warriors. He was traded to the Lakers in 2014 and signed with the Atlanta Hawks that offseason. The very next season, Golden State made it to the NBA Finals and defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers in six games.

Bazemore did send his congratulations to his former teammates, but he also poked fun at himself for leaving the Warriors for the Lakers this past offseason.