Photo credit: Airbnb
DeMarcus Cousins has settled in on the court with the Golden State Warriors, but he’s been comfortable his whole time in the Bay Area thanks to a partnership with Airbnb.
Through his first seven games with the Warriors, he has averaged 14 points and seven rebounds coming off a torn Achilles tendon suffered last year while a member of the New Orleans Pelicans. Plus, he recently had a thunderous dunk over the Los Angeles Lakers’ Kyle Kuzma that lit up the internet.
Coming into this season, Cousins knew he had to find a fit that would set him up well in rehabilitation and give him a solid chance at an NBA championship — as the playoffs have eluded him his first nine seasons.
He settled on the Warriors, and in doing so had to move to the Bay Area quickly. Cousins found a spacious home in San Francisco that offered him the amenities he needed to comfortably recover for his return to the court.
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“We needed to get him out there fairly quickly,” said Matt Davis, senior vice president of basketball marketing at Independent Sports & Entertainment. “He was rehabbing at the time and needed a place with a comfortable environment that could accommodate his trainers and chef — and for us, Airbnb was a perfect fit.”
Davis sat down with representatives from Airbnb, headquartered in San Francisco, and forged a partnership with Airbnb for Work. It’s the first partnership with an athlete for Airbnb for Work.
Cousins is no longer in the home, but it allowed him the time to find the ideal home for his circumstances better than the normal corporate condominiums used for athletes in similar situations, Davis said.
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As part of the partnership, Cousins shot a video with production company OBB Pictures, which included his personal chef and security detail for a look into his life off the court in the Airbnb home. Davis said Cousins is drawn to organic partnerships he truly believes in and uses.
“It just made sense, and the timing was great,” Davis said. “Authenticity is key to DeMarcus in what he does.”
The downtime from his injury has led to a number of other opportunities for Cousins, including a documentary set to be released on Showtime this spring about his recovery process. The injury was gruesome and hard on Cousins, Davis said. He teased the documentary, where Cousins apparently mentioned several times he thought retiring might be the better option than the grueling rehabilitation process.
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“We sat down and asked, ‘how do we turn this negative into a positive and use it as motivation too?’” Davis said of the documentary. “You can’t take anything for granted, and this summer was difficult and very eye-opening, looking at his contract and what would be the best for his career.”
Cousins was also announced as the face of Puma Basketball late last year and is involved with Shock Doctor and 2K Sports, in part, because he loves gaming himself.
The Warriors are cruising again, winning six of the seven games Cousins has been back while boasting a 37-15 overall record this season. The playoffs, of course, will ultimately decide the NBA champion, but Cousins has the best opportunity of his career ahead of him. What it all means this offseason and where he plays next year is up in the air, but like every other move he’s made, he’ll think about what’s best for his himself and his career.
“He’s always been focused off the court and on the court,” Davis said. “He loves taking care of it on the court, but he’s a workhorse off it. He won’t get into something unless he actually believes in it, and at the end of the day, he’s into very organic partnerships.”
