Duke basketball: The 10 most hated Blue Devils of all time

The most hated Duke basketball faces: JJ Redick

The head-bobs. The slick grin. A little smack talk. The picture-perfect 3-pointers that led to his Duke-record 2,769 points for his career.

All that is pretty much all JJ Redick ever did to infuriate fans.

Maybe timing also contributed to the hate Redick experienced. After all, other than Shane Battier, Steve Wojciechowski, and to an extent, Jason Williams (another who probably should have at least been an honorable mention here), the program had boasted several “cool” players — Elton Brand, Carlos Boozer, Corey Maggette, etc. — in the years leading up to Redick’s arrival.

Put simply, the haters had gotten hungry.

Whatever the reasons, let’s allow Redick to describe what the hate looked and sounded like. See, the fact he even ranks one spot lower than the next guy on this list comes from the conclusions he and the next guy on this list came up with when discussing this very topic last week on Redick’s podcast:

“In one game my sophomore year, these four things happened…I come out for warmups, there’s a sign that says JJ drinks his own pee…there’s also a sign that makes a reference to a lewd sex act with my 12-year-old sister…then, there’s a group of students, sitting on the first row, who have these custom T-shirts made, and they say, When I grow up, I want to name my kid JJ Redick, and then on the back it says, And beat him every day…”

Redick continued:

“Then, the Baltimore Ravens owner starts talking [expletive] to me; he’s sitting courtside…Then, at the end of the game, I’m hitting the sorta game-clinching free throws, and the entire arena starts chanting, [Expletive] you, JJ…that was pretty much every road game that I had at Duke…I didn’t have to deal with social media, and thank God I didn’t because I don’t know that I would have not been kicked off the Duke team.”

Had Redick won a national title as a Blue Devil, there’s no doubt his name would appear a spot or two higher on this list. As it is, though, as Redick even essentially admitted in the case of this next guy, it’s hard to argue that the three faces landing above his here are plenty worthy of their rankings…