JJ Redick: “We can go into the back story of the incident with the teenager— Ja is claiming self-defense; that the teenager threw the ball in his face. We can go into the incident at the mall when he yelled at his security guard. We can go into the incident with the Indiana Pacers traveling party. As far as we know, all of these things have been investigated and no law has been broken. I'm not condoning the behavior, I'm not saying there should be no punishment. There should be. There should be consequences. You are the face of the league, you are representing the NBA, you are a role model to young kids. All of that— I don't think half a season is the right answer. You bring this up, the guns on social media—we talk about ‘consequences.’ In our country right now, gun culture is pervasive. We've got mass shooting after mass shooting, and nobody's doing a damn thing about it. So I get why we're so sensitive to this right now, but there's no consequence for Greg Abbott telling his constituents that they should go buy more guns, and then we have mass shooting after mass shooting in Texas. There's no consequence for an elected Tennessee official to send out a Christmas card holding AR-15s with his young family, and then there's a shooting in his very district. There's no consequences to that, so why are we trying to lay down the hammer on a 23-year-old who didn't break a law? Explain that to me.”
Jason Whitlock: “It’s great that you played basketball at Duke with some Black teammates, great you had a nice long NBA career with a lot of Black teammates, it's great that you socialize with some of the most elite, well-off, and protected Black people on the planet... That's awesome, JJ, don't really want to ridicule you or belittle you, but you sound like an idiot. What Ja Morant is doing is putting himself in harm's way and he's putting other people in harm's way. Him using and treating a gun as a toy, a prop, and an accessory is putting Ja Morant in harm's way. When a police officer eventually pulls Ja Morant over in a car because of all the videos, because the way Ja Morant has portrayed himself, that policeman is going to be very suspicious of Ja Morant. Does he have a gun? Is he drunk or high? Does he plan on playing or flashing that gun the way I've seen him do in videos? If it doesn't get Ja Morant harmed maybe it'll get that policeman harmed. Maybe it'll get a passenger in the car harmed. Let's suppose Ja Morant being 23, goes to a club in Memphis or anywhere, and gets in a dispute, an argument, an altercation with someone who's really about that life? That person who's really about that life is like ‘this is Ja Morant, he carries a gun… Well, I happen to carry a gun. Ja Morant pretends to be about that life. I'm going to pull out this gun and use it on Ja Morant because he could potentially use it against me.’ Ja Morant is a walking billboard advertisement of ‘I want some type of gun violence drama to happen with me.’ He is sowing the seeds for that type of violence and misbehavior that we know is commonplace in Memphis, in Black communities, in urban areas— we know it's commonplace and so we're watching a child play with fire. Watching a child put his hand on a hot stove over, and over, and over again, and we don't need JJ Redick for likes, clicks, retweets, social media clout, television ratings; we don't need JJ Redick on TV trying to build his profile and brand of ‘I'm the number one ally to all these idiots.’ We don't need that, JJ Redick, because there are people that are actually out here saying ‘hey JJ, hey Ja, this behavior may end up getting you, someone close to you, or someone you don't know, hurt, and that's why people are calling for Ja Morant to be disciplined harshly to cut out this behavior.' Greg Abbott telling people in Texas to arm themselves and use their Second Amendment rights; there is no clear-cut connection between that behavior and these mass shootings that you love to talk about. There's no clear-cut connection. There's actual political and real justification for Greg Abbott telling his citizens ‘arm yourself, use guns legally, protect yourself from this tyrannical government, the founders wanted you armed, they wanted the government to fear you.’ The politicians using guns in their Christmas cards— if you can show me a clear connection between those Christmas cards and violence in the hood, in the suburbs, ANYWHERE, not something you pull out of your rear end and speculate about. Across the street from me right here in Nashville, I can walk from my very expensive apartment building without losing my breath, and without any effort to a place right across the street from me where there's been at least three murders in the short time that I've lived here, and several shootings at this one particular nightclub. There's one particular demographic involved in every one of those shootings. Those guys take their cues from people like Ja Morant. Whoever sent out the Christmas card they know nothing about. Their behavior is not connected to whoever sent out those Christmas cards. I get it, everybody wants to be the most ‘down’ White guy in the world, and wants to be the most ‘down’ White guy connected to NBA players, and I'm sure all the NBA players are celebrating ‘YEAH, JJ! HE’S A REAL ONE! KEPT IT REAL FOR JA!’ Nah, man, if you really want some clout I would love to go back and see— what did JJ Redick have to say about Kyrie Irving when he was getting beat up over a movie poster? You want to keep it real and show how 'down' you are for the Black man? Stand up for Kyrie Irving when he was catching heat over NOTHING. A movie poster about Black people or Jewish people's history. This smells like a gimmick to me. Everybody wants to be the cool White boy, and this is your turn to be the cool White boy and get some points back from when you beat up on Stephen A. Smith and people got upset with you. Now you got some cool points, you defended Ja Morant and everybody waving a gun. Good job, JJ Redick… Sellout.” (Full Segment Above)
Watch Jason Whitlock of ‘Fearless’ rip former NBA player and current ESPN studio analyst JJ Redick for coming to the defense of Memphis Grizzlies star Ja Morant in the form of a derisive anti-Republican rant on-air that attempted to diminish Morant’s bizarre antics flashing firearms on Instagram live.
Check out the segment above as Whitlock says Redick sounds like an ‘idiot’ trying to gain street cred as the ‘cool White boy’ who defends embattled Black NBA players.
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