Celtics star Kyrie Irving wants to retire in his mid-30s

Celtics superstar Kyrie Irving has no aspirations to take Uncle Drew to an NBA court, as the 26-year-old has seemingly hinted at the not-so-distant future (seven or eight years) as the potential end of his National Basketball Association career.

“Once I’m done with this, hopefully in my early to mid-30s, I’m done with this," Irving said on Friday.

The answer came when asked if he could ever envision himself playing into his 40s like Vince Carter (the 41-year-old Carter played 10 minutes against the Celtics in Friday's loss to Boston), and with Irving acknowledging the fact that the life of a professional basketball player isn't all it's cracked up to be at all times.

“I don’t want to go into major detail, but I would just say I wish there was sometimes more empathy in terms of what we’ve committed ourselves to doing every single day,” Irving, peeling the curtain back ever so slightly, said of life in the NBA. “Putting our bodies on the line, understanding kind of the mental strain you put on just trying to be great every single day, and just literally putting the ball in the hoop better than you did yesterday.”

That apparent desire to call it quits earlier than most may be helped by the fact that Irving's already captured a championship, and has already started the process of extending his career outside of basketball by way of movies and commercials.

It's not the first time Irving has talked about his desires outside of basketball. It was just earlier this season that Irving mentioned that his post-basketball life will most likely be spent off the grid in more ways than one.

“I’ll probably be in 800 acres in Texas in the middle of nowhere,” Irving said at the Forbes Under 30 Summit back in October. “Off the grid in a self-sustaining community, just living with no power. Like this is fun and all, but technology is just killing me, man.”

Well, you can't say Irving's not interesting.