Kyrie Irving downplays Jimmy Butler chatter, sounds upbeat on his future with Celtics

With plenty of speculation about his future swirling over the past couple months, Kyrie Irving looked to get a little bit ahead of the story with media day looming on Monday. Jackie MacMullan of ESPN.com caught up with the point guard in a recent interview in which Irving addressed his health, rumors around him uniting with Jimmy Butler and the Celtics' outlook for this season and beyond. A few of the more notable quotes from the piece:

On his health heading into training camp: "I'm moving completely differently. I've worked on my strength and have a heightened awareness of what my body needs on a day-to-day basis. I spent all summer trying to get my left leg to catch up with my right. And it's there."

On the C's title chances: "Can we beat Golden State in a seven-game series? Yes ... because of who we have and what we're establishing here, not just for this season, but hopefully for the next few years, something that's pretty special."

On his future in Boston: "Who wouldn't be a part of this? Who wouldn't want to be a part of Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum and Al Horford and Gordon Hayward? People keep saying, 'Why won't he commit to Boston?' Well, there are financial implications involved."

Irving also downplayed rumors swirling around his connection and potential hopes to team up with Butler in the piece, noting that he had not talked at length with the All-Star guard since their time together at USA basketball in 2016.

BSJ Analysis: The summer is full of endless storylines and manufactured angles, which made the smoke swirling around Irving's uncertain future get a little more focus than usual.

However, we covered here at Boston Sports Journal back in June the situation that Irving was facing and the remarks made in this story echo the sentiments he gave BSJ in an exclusive interview earlier this offseason.

Irving is a savvy talker and he chooses his words carefully. He's never going to fully commit to the Celtics publicly before he has to because it's not in his financial interest to do so. Why give the Celtics any extra leverage in future negotiations by declaring he's staying now? It makes no sense from a business standpoint.

With that said, Irving's remarks here are encouraging if you're a Celtics fan. He raves about his teammates, the environment and the team's future, all points that make the C's brass confident that they will be able to retain the point guard next summer.

We'll get a taste of just how good this team looks with all the pieces together in the coming weeks but it continues to be hard to envision Irving walking away from this core if they play up to their expectations. If the All-Star wants to win and lead, it's hard to find a more appealing place for him to do that than Boston.