ESPN’s Kendrick Perkins Doubles Down After His Suggestion That NBA Award Voters Are Racist Sparks Outrage: ‘A Speaker of TRUTH Has No Friends!’
Screenshot
ESPN analyst Kendrick Perkins doubled down on his suggestion that the writers who vote on the NBA’s MVP award are racist.
Perkins appeared on First Take last week to discuss Denver Nuggets star center Nikola Jokić’s chances of winning the MVP award.
Perkins took issue with the fact that Jokić is being considered for the award despite not ranking in the top 10 in scoring for the 2022-2023 NBA season. The ESPN analyst pointed out that two other men have won the award with similar numbers, former Dallas Mavericks star Dirk Nowitzki and former Phoenix Suns star Steve Nash. All three men are White players.
“What do those guys have in common? I’ll let it sit there and marinate. You think about it,” Perkins said. “When it comes down to moving the goalposts for certain individuals to win it, again, is it Oochie Wally? Or is it One Mic? What song are we actually dancing to right now? Why is this subject not brought up?”
On Tuesday’s installment of ESPN’s debate program, analyst JJ Redick brought up Perkins’ comments.
“What we just witnessed is the problem with this show,” Redick said. “Where we create narratives that do not exist in reality. The implication what you are implying that the White voters that vote on NBA are racist. They favor White people.”
From there, the two got into a very combative verbal altercation before the segment ended.
Shortly after First Take ended, Perkins doubled down his suggestion in a series of tweets on Tuesday afternoon.
Last year I was a c**n. This year I’m a racist. Well damn, which one is it? IT’S NEITHER. I call out facts and not afraid to address the elephant in the room.
A Speaker of TRUTH has no friends!!!
Perkins was then called out by former NBA coach George Karl. He wrote to Perkins, “Untrue @KendrickPerkins cause honest educated people respect Truth. Also don’t forget that Truth is about facts not casual opinions.”
Perkins responded with:
.@CoachKarl22 do you of all people want to go there today? Because I definitely have time homeboy. YOU most definitely have a few Skeletons in your damn closet.
When one Twitter user claimed Redick “won” the debate, Perkins fired back and was uneasy with the conversation, but it needed to be done.
That wasn’t a win or lose debate!!! That was uncomfortable conversation that was way passed due! It’s never a win or a lose when a white man and Black man are arguing about race… because we can’t relate
He was accused of “walking it back,” which he adamantly denied and doubled down.
I didn’t walk a damn thing back!!! I’m still standing on what I said
In his final tweet about the topic, one user thinks Perkins “got cooked by JJ,” and he was not interested in hearing something like that.
He didn’t cook shit. I said Players be stat padding including Jokic… and it’s okay to do that. Just own it. Nobody thought that Giannis (Antetokounmpo) stat pad until they witnessed it the other day
—
