You don’t have to agree with everything someone says or believes. Where’s it written that you should? We should be allowed to agree to disagree and give credit to people when they get it right instead of only focusing on people when their opinion might be a little off.
NBA Hall of Famer and commentator Charles Barkley gave his two cents about the Breonna Taylor grand jury decision Thursday evening before Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals between the Denver Nuggets and Los Angeles Lakers, and it wasn’t what we’ve been hearing from some associated with the NBA.
God bless Barkley. He also is the only NBA commentator willing to point out that Brianna Taylor’s boyfriend fired first and hit a cop before they returned fire at him. The lack of basic factual understanding in this case is staggering. pic.twitter.com/2DFIs1XjNn
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) September 25, 2020
Here’s a short transcript of Barkley’s assessment:
I feel bad this young lady lost her life, but, you know, we do have to take into account her boyfriend did shoot at the cops and shot a cop. So, like I say, even though I am really sorry she lost her life, I just don't think we can put this in the same situation as George Floyd or Ahmaud Arbery. I just don’t believe that.
Barkley’s comments are in sharp contrast to those made by others, like activist LeBron James and ESPN NBA analyst Jalen Rose.
“We lost a beautiful woman in Breonna," James said following the Lakers win over the Nuggets. "We want justice no matter how long it takes, even though it's been so many days, so many hours, so many minutes for her family, for her community.”
As for Rose, he just decided to blurt out his thought in the middle of answering a question about the Miami Heat guard Tyler Herro’s performance on Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals between the Boston Celtics and the Heat.
“He [Herro] been putting in work for a young fella,” Rose said before injecting his politics into the game. “But it’d also be a great day to arrest the cop that murdered Breonna Taylor!”
It’s sad that we’ve come to a point where the headline for the results of a playoff game — or any game for that matter — is what the commentators, players or coaches said about politics and social issues.
Remember, when it was mostly about the game? It seems like so long ago now.