ESPN’s Jalen Rose Rips Phil Jackson for Criticizing NBA’s Social Justice Push: Coached ‘The Greatest Black Athletes Ever and ‘Made Millions On Their Backs’

A top ESPN NBA analyst has condemned remarks from 11-time championship coach Phil Jackson — who slammed the league’s social justice initiatives.

In a commentary posted to Twitter, ESPN’s Jalen Rose blasted Jackson for saying that he no longer watches the NBA because he feels it has gotten too political.

“They even had [social justice] slogans on the floor, on the baseline,” Jackson said, in a recent interview on the Tetragrammaton podcast. “It was catering. It was trying to cater to an audience, or trying to bring a certain audience into play. And they didn’t know it was turning other people off. People want to see sports as non-political.”

Rose slammed the famed coach’s comments.

“You can’t make this up,” Rose said. He added, “The same Phil Jackson that won championships with some of the greatest Black athletes in the history of the game. Michael Jordan. Scottie Pippen. Shaquille O’Neal. Kobe Bryant. Made millions on their backs. And off their sweat equity.”

The ESPN analyst called out Jackson for mocking the NBA for players wearing social justice messages such as “justice” and “equal opportunity” on the back of their jerseys, instead of their names.

“They had things on their back like ‘Justice’ and a funny thing happened,” Jackson said. “Like ‘Justice went to the basket and Equal Opportunity knocked him down’… Some of my grandkids thought it was pretty funny to play up those names. I couldn’t watch that.”

“You’re sitting there watching the game with your grandkids, and ya’ll think it’s funny when justice passes the ball to equal opportunity?” Rose said. “When somebody shows you who they are, believe them.”

Watch above, via Twitter.

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