Kyrie Irving has always described his decision to remain unvaccinated, and as a result miss nearly two-thirds of the season, as a personal choice. But on Sunday night, after his first game at Barclays Center this season, his comments about that decision expanded beyond the personal. "The point of this season for me was never to just take a stance," he said. "It was really to make sure that I'm standing in what I believe in, in freedom. Freedom I don't think that's a word that gets defined enough in our society, about the freedom to make choices with your life without someone telling you what the [expletive] to do ... There's nobody that's enslaving me." He added: "Tonight my presence out there was bigger than a basketball game " just representing a lot of individuals that are out there in a similar situation as me, and now that I can play, I think we should be opened up for everybody." That, of course, currently is the focus of controversy. Originally, Irving could not play because of a since-repealed mandate that dictated that people entering indoor entertainment venues had to be vaccinated. After that ended on March 7, a different mandate came into focus: a private-sector mandate that had gone into effect on Dec. 27 and stated that all those who do in-person work or interact with the public in their employment also need to be vaccinated. As a result, nearly 1,500 city workers were fired in February. It's not clear how many private workers also were fired.