Sports
Nate McMillan, Scott Brooks and the infamous NBA brawl that’s a part of JJ Redick’s Lakers
LOS ANGELES — It was one week into his new job as coach of the Los Angeles Lakers when JJ Redick had a sudden rush of horror.
He had just hired his first two assistant coaches, and he couldn’t have been more pleased. Nate McMillan had 19 years of NBA head-coaching experience. And Scott Brooks spent 12 years as an NBA head coach. Both played point guard in the NBA, McMillan for 12 seasons and Brooks for 10. They had a combined 1,281 wins as coaches.
It was the perfect blend of experience, knowledge and credibility that Redick felt he needed beside him as a first-time coach.
But then, the rush of horror: Someone sent him a video.
As Redick watched, his jaw dropped. There on his screen were McMillan and Brooks at each other’s throats during a 1993 playoff game. Their dust-up — McMillan elbowing Brooks in the jaw as he drove baseline, and Brooks launching into McMillan in retaliation — sparked a bench-clearing brawl in the third quarter of Game 5 between McMillan’s Seattle SuperSonics and Brooks’ Houston Rockets.
Both McMillan and Brooks were ejected and later fined.
“I was like, ‘Jesus! How did I not know this?’” Redick remembers saying to himself.
Before Redick had watched the video, he had scheduled a video call with McMillan and Brooks for the next day. He planned to talk plays, philosophy and ask the veteran coaches how they would map out training camp. Now, knowing what he knew about their past, he felt he needed a different opening to the meeting.
“So, I get on the Zoom the next day, and am like, ‘Uh, first off … are you guys OK? Are we good here? Because I was unaware,’” Redick said.
Over the last 31 years, McMillan said he and Brooks never really talked to each other about their confrontation. Even in the immediate wake of the fight, before Game 6, there was no handshake, no apology, no nothing.
And it pretty much stayed that way for three decades.
“We didn’t acknowledge that until we coached against each other,” McMillan said. “And even then, we would just kind of nod at each other and smile. But you know, in the back of your mind it’s … that’s the guy …”
When the two were announced as Redick’s top assistants on July 3, the stalemate was broken. Redick said the two told him they connected on the phone after their hires.
“They worked it out,” Redick said.
Turns out, there wasn’t much to work out. As players, McMillan and Brooks were never the most talented guys on the floor. They had extended careers because they were smart and scrappy. The way each held his ground that day in Seattle could have been any other day in their careers: No backing down, no inch given.
So, after the incident, there was no need to address it. Neither player held a grudge. Neither had regret. It was business as usual.
But all these years later, a funny thing happened once they joined Redick’s staff and got to know each other. McMillan and Brooks found they are linked by more than just their scuffle.
“We’re the same guy,” McMillan said.
By the time Game 5 arrived in the second-round series between Seattle and Houston in 1993, McMillan was on edge.
McMillan and Brooks were backups — McMillan to Gary Payton and Brooks to Kenny Smith — and they were beginning to face off more as the series evolved. Brooks’ minutes increased from nine and seven in the first two games to 21 minutes in Games 3 and 4. That meant Brooks and McMillan often going head-to-head.
“They had (Vernon) Maxwell over there acting crazy and s—, and we were already fired up to play them,” McMillan said. “And then, (Brooks) was out there being a pest, scrapping and clawing for everything … and I just had enough.”
It was a marquee playoff matchup — Houston and Seattle both finished 55-27 and were stacked with stars: The Sonics with a young Payton and Shawn Kemp and Houston with accomplished veterans Hakeem Olajuwon, Otis Thorpe and Smith.
In his seventh NBA season, McMillan was a lanky 6-foot-5 floor general, known for his steady and reliable decisions and dogged defense. Brooks was a pesky, 5-foot-10 jitter bug — a pass-first point guard who took pride in being a nuisance on defense.
The series was tied 2-2, and as Game 5 unfolded, McMillan and Brooks found themselves tangled and locked up with each other on several occasions. In the third quarter, McMillan drove left and tried to lose Brooks on a screen by teammate Derrick McKey. Brooks bounced off McKey and immediately re-engaged with McMillan, touching and bumping him along the way.
“They had been banging pretty good, all game,” referee Bob Delaney told The Athletic. “I thought they would figure it out one way or another.”
They did.
McMillan tried to create space by giving Brooks a nudge with his elbow. As he continued toward the basket, McMillan gave another elbow. All the while, Brooks remained unfazed, still attached to McMillan’s side.
“At that point, it was like … enough is enough,” McMillan said.
McMillan continued driving and rose toward the basket, his elbow catching Brooks flush on the chin. Brooks responded by lunging at McMillan and grabbing his jersey near the armpits. Brooks pushed McMillan into the basket stanchion.
Then, mayhem.
Thorpe threw Kemp to the floor. Players dogpiled under the basket. Sonics coach George Karl was in the middle of it all, spinning and spewing, later admitting he was trying to get Thorpe to punch him so the Rockets forward would get suspended.
Beneath it all was McMillan and Brooks.
“I was trying to get underneath him,” McMillan said. “But he was too small … so we just went to the floor. Someone got put in a chokehold … and we were all on the floor tussling and all that, but no blows were thrown or anything.”
Delaney, the lead official, broke his right pinky while trying to break up the quarrel. To this day, his pinky juts out at an odd angle.
“So, I’m reminded of that game daily,” Delaney said with a chuckle. “And the funny thing is, those are two good, good guys. Great guys. It was just a heat-of-the-battle thing.”
McMillan and Karl were fined $5,000. Brooks was fined $2,000.
The Sonics went on to win Game 5, and later the series after a 103-100 win in Game 7, with the lasting image of a memorable series provided by two backups.
It shouldn’t have been a surprise that McMillan and Brooks would find themselves tussling on the court. Brooks, after all, was in seventh grade when his mother drove him to the house of a kid who beat up Brooks. She watched as her son got his revenge on the kids’ front lawn. The lesson: Never get bullied.
McMillan, meanwhile, had his own experience with sticking up for himself. Earlier in his career, he got into it with Maxwell after the Rockets guard undercut him in a game, and he fought with big men Kevin Willis and Mark Bryant.
“Kevin Willis hit me with a cheap shot — a screen — and I tried to take his head off,” McMillan said. “Same thing with Mark Bryant.”
Brooks, who has taken a no-media stance since joining the Lakers, twice declined to be interviewed for this story. It’s not because Brooks harbors ill feelings or regret about the incident.
“We laugh about it all the time now,” McMillan said. “The first thing I saw when they announced they had signed both of us was the video (of the fight). And my daughter (Brittany) was like, ‘Dad!?! What is going on?’ She had never seen that, she didn’t know. And Scotty’s kid and wife said the same thing: ‘What are you guys doing?’”
It didn’t take long for McMillan to discover he and Brooks share something more than a memorable tussle.
“He is the coolest MFer, man,” McMillan said. “I could hang with him.”
McMillan related to Brooks’ backstory — a 10-year NBA career after being undrafted — and he remembered his hard-nosed style of play.
“We both had to come up through this s— the hard way,” McMillan said. “We weren’t scorers; we were hard-hat guys. Glue guys. We had to scrap in order to make it in this league.”
As McMillan spent more time with Brooks, he also became drawn to his knowledge and the way Brooks interacted with people.
“We are very similar,” McMillan said. “We are no-nonsense. Old school. But he is different from me in that he can communicate in a way that I can’t. Like, you look at me, and you don’t know if we are up 40 or down 40. Scotty actually smiles. He actually has a personality. And that makes him great with the staff and the team. Like, I could play for him. Just a great deal of respect for him.”
Scott Brooks (left) and Nate McMillan coached against each other for years after their brawl as players but never acknowledged the dust-up until joining the Lakers staff last summer. (Mike Ehrmann / Getty Images)
When Redick was hired in June, the extent of his sideline experience was coaching his son’s third-grade team in Brooklyn. As a result, Redick said he and Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka wanted to hire two former head coaches to assist him.
Redick, a sharpshooter who logged 15 seasons in the NBA, never played for McMillan or Brooks. He said his interaction with McMillan was limited to a 2018 free-agency pitch made by Indiana, when McMillan was the head coach (Redick chose to sign with Philadelphia). However, Redick played a season and a half with New Orleans, where McMillan’s son, Jamelle, was a player development coach.
“I just always felt really comfortable with the person and character of Nate,” Redick said. “And as my name got involved in the coaching stuff, I had a half-dozen people reach out and say, ‘Non-negotiable, you have to hire Scotty Brooks.”
Redick says they have both been “perfect fits” because each can offer a different perspective.
“I call both of them my spiritual gurus,” Redick said. “They are great with the X’s and O’s stuff — our entire staff is — but I think with them, it’s just … they have seen everything having been in the NBA 35-40 years. There are three or four times a week where I’m like, ‘Hey, did I handle that right? How should I handle this … and what did your teams do when they were going through X, Y, Z?’ They have lived it all.”
McMillan, who last coached the Atlanta Hawks in 2023, said the offer to join Redick’s staff was too good to turn down. He said he knew he was done with head coaching after being fired by the Hawks, but the chance to coach LeBron James and Anthony Davis, and to not have to deal with the headaches of being a head coach appealed to him.
“I’m over the first seat. I’m done with that,” McMillan said. “My thing is to assist JJ and give him my thoughts, and whatever he decides, assist him on his decision. I’m not the offensive coach. I’m not the defensive coach. I just kind of chat with everybody, help with game management, and, if he has any questions, tell him what I see.”
One of the first pieces of advice McMillan offered involved James, one of the game’s biggest superstars. He implored Redick to hold firm and believe in his system, believe in his coaching, even if James pushes back.
“One thing I’ve learned as I’ve played and coached in this league is those stars want to be coached, too,” McMillan said. “They want to be coached, and they need to be coached. So, I’m telling JJ here that LeBron, he’s going to question everything … because he’s great. But if you believe what you are doing, it’s OK. It’s that old saying: If we are both agreeing on everything, then s—, we don’t need one of you.’”
JJ Redick hired Brooks (center) and McMillan without realizing their history. “I was like, ‘Jesus! How did I not know this?’’’ Redick remembers saying to himself. (Harry How/Getty Images)
McMillan said Redick has been exceptional in the way he has delivered his message to the Lakers. He said it’s like watching one of the game’s Redick called when he was an announcer for ESPN.
“He’s almost like Hubie (Brown), how when you watch one of his games, he makes you understand it,’’ McMillan said. “He’s doing that for his players. The X’s and O’s, and putting all that together — he has to work on that, and he has (assistant) Greg St. Jean, who is really helping him. All that will come. But his ability to communicate with players, he’s been great. He challenges them all; he coaches them all. And he’s not afraid of LeBron. He respects him, but he says what he thinks and what he wants to say.”
And somewhere down the line this season, Redick says he will hold a special film session with the team. It will be the clip from Game 5 of the 1993 playoffs, when two assistants on the Lakers bench went head-to-head … and beyond.
“At some point, I’m going to show that clip to the team,’’ Redick said. “Just so they can understand who those two f—s are.’’
(Photo illustration: Dan Goldfarb/The Athletic; Getty; Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE, Thearon W. Henderson)
Sports
Eileen Gu reflects on decision to leave Team USA for China: ‘A lot of people just don’t understand’
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Eileen Gu released a statement on social media Monday, reflecting on her controversial decision to compete for Team China despite being born and raised in the U.S.
Gu’s statement tied the decision back to her passion for promoting women’s sports, and encouraging young girls to pursue sports.
“I gave my first speech on women in sports and title IX when I was 11 years old. I talked about being the only girl on my ski team, and, despite attending an all-girls’ school from Monday through Friday, becoming best friends with my teammates on the weekends through the common language of sport,” Gu wrote on Instagram.
Silver medalist Eileen Gu of China poses for photos after the awarding ceremony of the freestyle skiing women’s freeski big air event at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games in Livigno, Italy, Feb. 16, 2026. (Photo by Wang Peng/Xinhua via Getty Images) (Wang Peng/Xinhua via Getty Images)
“At the same time, I was made painfully aware of the lack of representation – at age 9, I felt that I was somehow representing all women every time I stepped in the terrain park. Landing tricks was about more than progression … it was about disproving the derisive implication of what it meant to ‘ski like a girl.’”
Gu went on to express gratitude for the one season in which she did compete for the U.S.
“When I was 15, I announced my decision to compete for China. At the time, I had spent one season on the US team, and had been lucky enough to meet my heroes in person. I am forever grateful for that season, and continue to maintain a close relationship with the team. I had spent every summer in China since I was 8 setting up summer camps on trampoline and dry slope for kids and adults, ranging from 7 to 47 years old, so I knew the industry was tiny. I felt like I knew everyone,” she added.
“Skiing for Team China meant the opportunity to uplift others through the universal culture of sport, and to introduce freeskiing to hundreds of millions of people who had never heard of it, especially with the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics around the corner.”
Gu’s statement concluded by acknowledging that certain people “don’t understand” her decision to compete for China over the U.S., while insisting the choice maximized the impact she would have.
“I can look back now, at 22, and tell 12 year old Eileen that there are now terrain parks full of little girls, who will never doubt their place in the sport. I can tell 15 year old me that there are now millions of girls who have started skiing since then, in China and worldwide,” Gu wrote.
“A lot of people won’t understand or believe that I made a decision to create the greatest amount of positive impact on the world stage that I could, at this age, given my interests and passions. Three golds and six medals later, I can confidently say was once a dream is now a reality.”
Gu has become a target for global criticism this Olympics for her decision to represent China while remaining silent on the country’s alleged human rights abuses.
In an interview with Time magazine, Gu was asked her thoughts on China’s alleged persecution of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim minorities in Xinjiang.
“I haven’t done the research. I don’t think it’s my business. I’m not going to make big claims on my social media,” Gu answered.
“I’m just more of a skeptic when it comes to data in general. … So, it’s not like I can read an article and be like, ‘Oh, well, this must be the truth.’ I need to have a ton of evidence. I need to maybe go to the place, maybe talk to 10 primary source people who are in a location and have experienced life there.
“Then I need to go see images. I need to listen to recordings. I need to think about how history affects it. Then I need to read books on how politics affects it. This is a lifelong search. It’s irresponsible to ask me to be the mouthpiece for any agenda.”
More controversy surrounding Gu erupted after The Wall Street Journal reported that Gu and another American-born athlete who now competes for China, were paid a combined $6.6 million by the Beijing Municipal Sports Bureau in 2025.
Gu is the highest-paid Winter Olympics athlete in the world, making an estimated $23 million in 2025 alone due to partnerships with Chinese companies, including the Bank of China and western companies.
Her alignment with China prompted criticism from many Americans this Olympics, including Vice President J.D. Vance.
“I certainly think that someone who grew up in the United States of America who benefited from our education system, from the freedoms and liberties that makes this country a great place, I would hope they want to compete with the United States of America,” Vance said in an interview on Fox News’ “The Story with Martha MacCallum.”
Later, when Gu was asked if she feels “like a bit of a punching bag for a certain strand of American politics at the moment,” she said she does.
“I do,” she said. “So many athletes compete for a different country. … People only have a problem with me doing it because they kind of lump China into this monolithic entity, and they just hate China. So, it’s not really about what they think it’s about.
“And, also, because I win. Like, if I wasn’t doing well, I think that they probably wouldn’t care as much, and that’s OK for me. People are entitled to their opinions.”
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Silver medalist Eileen Gu of China attends the awarding ceremony of the freestyle skiing women’s freeski big air event at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games in Livigno, Italy, Feb. 16, 2026. (Hongxiang/Xinhua via Getty Images)
Gu has claimed she was “physically assaulted” for the decision.
“The police were called. I’ve had death threats. I’ve had my dorm robbed,” Gu told The Athletic.
“I’ve gone through some things as a 22-year-old that I really think no one should ever have to endure, ever.”
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From Hollywood actors to Olympic athletes and politicians, California’s newest Hall of Fame class runs the gamut in talent and achievements.
Academy Award-winning actress Jamie Lee Curtis and former governor/action star Arnold Schwarzenegger, Olympic champions Janet Evans and Carl Lewis, authors Riane Eisler and Terry McMillan, chef Nobuyuki Matsuhisa, groundbreaking ensemble Mariachi Reyne de Los Ángeles and former state Democratic leader John L. Burton all earned a spot into the assembly of distinct Californians, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Tuesday.
This class, the 19th in state history, will be formally enshrined during a ceremony at the California Museum in Sacramento on March 19 as a “celebration of their contributions to civic life, creativity, and social progress,” according to Newsom’s office.
The inductees “have reshaped our culture and our communities. Resilient and innovative, these leaders and luminaries represent the best of the California spirit,” Newsom said in a statement.
To be inducted, candidates must have lived in California for at least five years and “have made achievements benefiting the state, nation and world,” according to the California Hall of Fame website. To date, 166 Californians have been selected by three governors since 2006.
Schwarzenegger, 78, served as the state’s 38th governor and last Republican head of state from 2003 to 2011. His renaissance man biography includes a career as a body builder, highlighted by his Mr. Universe titles, action film success, political stardom and even tabloid-fodder infidelity.
Curtis, 67, a Santa Monica native, is among Hollywood’s elite and teamed with Schwarzenegger in the action blockbuster “True Lies” in 1994. Her acting career dates to 1977, and she earned a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award in 2023 for “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”
Evans, 54, is a four-time Olympic gold medal swimmer and Fullerton native who attended Placentia El Dorado High School, Stanford University and USC. She serves as chief athletic officer for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.
Lewis, 64, is considered by many one of the greatest athletes of the 20th century. The track star won 10 medals, nine of them gold, in four Olympics.
Eisler, 88, and McMillan, 74, added multiple bestsellers to this Hall of Fame class.
Eisler’s critically acclaimed “The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future” examines roughly 20,000 years of partnership between men and women and male domination over the last 5,000 years. The futurist, cultural historian and Holocaust survivor who has degrees in sociology and law from UCLA said she was informed of the honor last year by Jennifer Siebel Newsom and recently was honored by the Austrian government with its Cross of Honour for Science and Art, First Class.
“I am very honored at this time in my life to be inducted into the California Hall of Fame,” Eisler wrote in an email. “I have worked tirelessly to help create a better world, and firmly believe that a new paradigm, a new way of looking at our world and our place in it, is crucial.”
McMillan has written a series of smash hits, including a couple that became major studio films in the ‘90s, “Waiting to Exhale” and “How Stella Got her Groove Back,” centered on Black women’s voices.
Matsuhisa, 76, know for his iconic Japanese restaurant Nobu, which has six locations in California, owns businesses across five continents.
Mariachi Reyna de Los Ángeles, founded in South El Monte, rewrote the rules of music, becoming the first all-woman mariachi ensemble that has entertained for more than three decades.
Burton, the former chair of the California Democratic Party who died last year at 92, boasted a political career that included time in the California State Assembly and Senate and the U.S. House.
“This year’s class embodies the very best of California — creativity, resilience and a spirit of community,” Siebel Newsom said in a statement. “These honorees remind us that innovation and courage flourish when people are lifted up by those around them.”
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Ali Haji-Sheikh and Shar Pourdanesh share the fact they are retired NFL players living beyond the glow of the NFL spotlight. But they also share another distinction tying them to current events: They are part of the Iranian diaspora hoping for the downfall of the Islamic revolution.
They make up part of a small group of men who played in the NFL – along with David Bakhtiari, his brother Eric Bakhtiari and T.J. Housmandzadeh – who are decedents of Iranians.
Washington Redskins kicker Ali Haji-Sheikh (6) talks to reporters at Jack Murphy Stadium during media day prior to Super Bowl XXII against the Denver Broncos. San Diego, California, on Jan. 26, 1988.(Darr Beiser/USA TODAY Sports)
Haji-Sheikh: Self-Determination For Iranians
Haji-Sheikh, 65, played in the 1980s for the New York Giants, Atlanta Falcons and Washington Redskins. He was a first-team All-Pro, made the Pro Bowl and was on the NFL All-Rookie team in 1983 for the Giants and, in his final season, won a Super Bowl XXII ring playing for the Washington Redskins and kicking six extra points in a 42-10 blowout of the Denver Broncos.
Now, Haji-Sheikh is the general manager at a Michigan Porsche-Audi dealership and is like the rest of us: Keeping up with world events when time permits.
Except the war the United States is currently waging against the Islamic Republic of Iran is kind of different because Haji-Sheikh’s dad emigrated from Iran to the United States in the 1950s and built a life here.
And his son would like to see freedom come to a country he’s never visited but has a kinship to.
“It’s a world event,” Haji-Sheikh said on Monday. “I am not a big fan of the Islamic revolution because I am not Islamic. I would like to see the people of Iran be able to determine their own future rather than it be determined by a few people. It would be nice to see them having a stable government where the people can actually decide how they want it to go.
Green Bay Packers kicker Al Del Greco (10) talks with New York Giants kicker Ali Haji-Sheikh (6) on Sept. 15, 1985, at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers defeated the Giants 23-20.
Iranians Celebrating And Americans Protesting
Haji-Sheikh hasn’t taken to the streets of his native Michigan to celebrate a liberation that hasn’t fully manifested mere days after the American and Israeli bombing and elimination of the Ayatollah.
“I’m so far removed from that,” Haji-Sheikh said. “My mom is from Michigan and of Eastern European background. My dad is from Iran. But it’s like, he hasn’t been back since I was in eighth grade, so that’s a long time ago. That was when the Shah was still in power, mid-70s, ‘74 or ’75, because if he ever went back after that he never would have left. They would have held him, so there was no intention of going back.
“But if things change he might want to go, you never know.”
Despite being removed from any activism about what is happening in Iran Haji-Sheikh is an astute observer.
“My favorite thing I’m seeing right now on TV is the Iranians in America celebrating because there’s a chance, a glimpse, maybe a hope for freedom,” Haji-Sheikh said. “And you have these people in New York protesting. What are you protesting?”
Pourdanesh Thanks America, Israel
Pourdanesh retired from the NFL in 2000 after a seven-year career with the Redskins and Steelers. The six-foot-six and 312-pound offensive tackle was born in Tehran. He proudly tells people he was the NFL’s first Iranian-born player.
Pourdanesh is much more visible and open about his feelings about his country than others. And, bottom line, he loves that President Donald Trump is bombing the Islamic regime.
“This is a great day for all Iranians across the world,” Pourdanesh posted on his Instagram account on Saturday when the war began. “Thank you, President Trump, thank you to the nation of Israel. Thank you for everybody that has been standing up for my people, my brothers and sisters in Iran across the world. This is a great day.
“The infamous dictator is dead – the one person who has contributed to deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iranians and other people around the world, if not more. So, congratulations to my Iranian brothers and sisters. Now, go and take back the country.”
This message was not a one-off. Pourdanesh has been posting about what has been happening in Iran since January, when people in Iran took to the streets demanding liberty and the government’s thugs began killing them, with some estimates rising to 36,500 deaths.
Offensive lineman Shar Pourdanesh (68) of the Pittsburgh Steelers blocks against defensive lineman Jevon Kearse (90) of the Tennessee Titans during a game at Three Rivers Stadium on Sept. 24, 2000, in Pittsburgh. The Titans defeated the Steelers 23-20. (Photo by George Gojkovich/Getty Images)
‘Islam Does Not Represent The Iranian People’
“[The] Islamic Republic does not represent the Iranian people,” Pourdanesh said in another post. “Islam does not represent the Iranian people. For almost 50 years, the Iranian people and our country of Iran has been taken hostage by a terrorist regime, and it’s time to take that regime down.”
Pourdanesh was not available for comment on Monday. I did speak to a handful of other Iranian-Americans on Monday. They didn’t play in the NFL, but their opinions are no less valuable than those of former NFL players.
And these people, some of them participating in rallies on behalf of a free Iran, do not understand the thinking of some Americans and mainstream media.
One complained that media that reports on reparations for black Americans based on slavery in the 1800s dismisses the Islamic takeover of the American Embassy in 1979 as an old grievance.
Another said his brother lives in England, where Prime Minister Keir Starmer immediately called the American and Israeli attacks on the Ayatollah’s regime “illegal” but, as the head of the Crown Prosecution Service took years to do the same of Muslim rape (grooming) gangs in the country.
(Starmer announced a national “statutory inquiry” in June 2025).
Offensive lineman Shar Pourdanesh of the Washington Redskins looks on from the sideline during a game against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Three Rivers Stadium on Sept. 7, 1997, in Pittsburgh. The Steelers defeated the Redskins 14-13. (Photo by George Gojkovich/Getty Images)
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Pourdanesh Calls Out NFL Silence
And finally, Pourdanesh put the NFL on blast. He said in yet another post that during his career, the NFL asked him to honor black history, asked him to stand for women’s rights, asked him to fight for equality for those who cannot defend themselves.
“I did everything they asked, and now I ask the NFL this: Where are you now? Why haven’t we heard a single word out of the NFL? NFL, Commissioner Roger Goodell, all the NFL teams out there, all the players who say they stand for social justice, where are you now?
“Why haven’t we heard a single word out of you with regard to the people who have been killed as of today? The very values you claim to espouse are being trampled right now. Why haven’t we heard a single word?”
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