As the Covid-19 pandemic continues around the country, and around the world, most of life remains on hold. That’s especially true for sports, with the NBA season shut down as the playoffs were just appearing on the horizon. Major league baseball never started its season, and now even the NFL season is in doubt.
At the TNT network, the crew of the popular show “Inside the NBA” have been getting together now and then (through video conferencing, of course) to talk about the latest developments, news and more. On a recent show this week (as of this writing), the discussion was all about the current racial protests. “Inside” members Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith talked about their experiences as black men in America.
One of the big topics on the latest show was the recent flap caused by New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees. Comments by Brees caused an uproar, especially among other professional athletes of all sports, after the popular quarterback said he would “never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the United States of America or our country.” The comments came in an interview with Brees talking about how the NFL should handle players potentially kneeling during the national anthem for this upcoming season. The story related back to former quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who was one of the first to take a knee in the 2016 season.
On Inside the NBA this week, commentator Charles Barkley called those comments “insensitive, especially during this time. I thought the negative reaction from every talking head on television and some of his teammates was overkill. I never heard a bad word about Drew Brees in my life. He made a mistake.”
Shaq was actually on a call with members of the Saints team earlier the same day. He said Brees apologized to his teammates (and others) for his remarks, and he repeated that apology on Instagram. While teammates did accept the apology, some also suggested Brees “do more positive things and less talking.”
Back on Inside the NBA, Kenny Smith said “It made it worse that it was Drew Brees, someone who we cheer for, who has teammates like us, that didn’t get us. Someone who is in the locker room every day. He doesn’t have the same excuse others may have had.”
Smith added, “Someone we cheered for is using his white privilege to say he couldn’t understand what we were going through in that moment. That was very offensive to me.”
Main host Ernie Johnson spoke about his grandfather’s military background and his understanding of how people hold the American flag in great reverence. But he added that those same people “cannot use the flag as a blindfold” to avoid acknowledging the issues of systemic racism in the United States.
You can see some of Shaq’s comments from the show as posted on Twitter. Click here for the video.