LOOK: Spurs' Kawhi Leonard apparently ditches the braids, and Twitter is not taking it well

One of the last bastions of the trend of the 2000s has fallen

By Kevin Skiver

Jun 21, 2017 at 1:01 pm ET • 1 min read

Braids were a staple of the NBA in the 2000s, and watching them die out has been a long, slow exercise in remembering that legends never last. Now, Kawhi Leonard, one of the last players in the NBA to have them, has apparently abandoned his cornrows, and now their watch has ended. Jeremy Lin appears to now be one of the last hopes that maybe, just maybe, long hair will make a surging comeback. The odds don't look great. It is unknown if the photo below is photoshopped. If it's real, then Leonard is really going for a new look.

RIP Kawhi Leonard braids 1991-2017 pic.twitter.com/VQ1jrWOAuQ
— Legends (@LegendsofCH) June 21, 2017

Just received a call from people close to Kawhi...told me this photo is fake. So there's that. His braids are still intact. #Spurs #NBA pic.twitter.com/m3ARHr5TVK
— Jabari Young (@JabariJYoung) June 21, 2017

Predictably, a lot of people are wildly upset by this development. It (maybe) happened without a warning. They were just gone. Leonard might have heartlessly cut his hair before asking the fans. How could he? It's an inevitable step as someone gets more famous (or maybe mature). Ludacris did it, Allen Iverson did it, Justin Timberlake (tragically) did it. Kawhi was supposed to bring balance to NBA hairstyles, not destroy them. Now, in this analogy, apparently Lin is equivalent to GOOD Music's Pusha T as the last holdout, which sort of makes all of this worth it.

Twitter, of course, did not take the news of Leonard seemingly ditching his braids kindly. Check it out: