Ingram: Durant is 'always sending me motivational things'

Kevin Durant has some skin in Brandon Ingram's game.

After all, Durant has said he sees a mirror image of himself in the similarly lanky forward who was drafted second overall in 2016, nine years after Durant himself went No. 2. And Ingram, for his part, has tried to model his game on Durant's.

That game, though, is still very much a work in progress. Ingram struggled through a pretty disappointing rookie season with the Los Angeles Lakers last year, putting up a woeful 8.5 PER on 47.4-percent true shooting for the league's third-worst team. But the 20-year-old says he's been getting regular (apparently coarse) advice and encouragement from the man to whom he's sometimes been compared.

"(Durant) is always sending me motivational things, though some things may need to be censored," Ingram told The Vertical's Michael Lee.

"He sees a lot in me. He actually told me to block out everything and be the killer that I am. To get a lot of guys around this league that see what I can be, it does nothing but make me want to work harder."

With his sophomore campaign set to begin Thursday night, Ingram is focusing on keeping things in perspective and developing the mental side of his game.

"For me, I just try to keep a level head, knowing that if I fail, it's because everything is not easy," he said. "I know with the position I'm in, I'm going to struggle and I'm going to do a lot of things, and it's going to help me in the long run because I put in a lot of work."

It doesn't hurt to have the reigning Finals MVP in corner.