After a couple rounds of sniping between Spurs Coach Greg Popovich and President Donald Trump, the China-NBA controversy has once again reached San Antonio.
A tweet from Sunday afternoon shows a fan attending a Spurs game holding a Chinese flag while reportedly yelling, “China owns the NBA.” The person was escorted out of the AT&T Center.
At a recent Washington Wizards game, a group of fans was reportedly escorted out of that team’s arena for raising signs and voicing support for pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong.
The demonstrations come in the wake of Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey’s now-deleted tweets of support for anti-government protestors in Hong Kong.
Popovich last week commended NBA commissioner Adam Silver on how he responded to the controversy, putting free speech above business matters. But Trump offered up a few choice words in response. The president and the coach have been at odds in the past, and Trump’s latest tirade accused Popovich of pandering to China. He also said the hoops legend had “no respect” for the U.S.
Popovich has since responded to Trump’s comments.
“All I did was make a comparison between Adam Silver’s show of principle and courage in a tough situation, as opposed to how our president reacts when in the company of authoritarian figures,” he said. “Whether it’s Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Russia or Turkey, whatever it is, it comes off as really feckless, impotent, cowardly by comparison.”
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This article appears in Oct 9-22, 2019.
