The National Basketball Association has fined the Golden State Warriors’ sixth man, Andre Iguodala, $10,000 for a racial remark he made after Friday night’s loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
ESPN reports that Iguodala was asked Friday night if he knew whether or not he would be sitting out Saturday’s game along with Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green.
“Nope, no clue,” Iguodala replied. “I do what master say.”
Iguodala reportedly clarified his remark to ESPN later and said that it was in no way a shot at coach Steve Kerr but, rather, a locker room in-joke.
According to ESPN, Iguodala also reportedly used the n-word during his media address Friday.
Before the league announced the fine, Iguodala spoke after Monday’s Warriors practice and expressed regret for the effect his comments had on the team.
“I feel like it’s the wrong time because it puts my team in that situation and coaching staff in that situation,” Iguodala said. “I have a great relationship with Steve Kerr, and he knows that. Steve spoke to you guys about it; you know what I mean. Steve in his words, someone still may not believe him, but he and I are in a great place. We don’t even have to speak about it because he knew that in no way, shape or form that I’m talking about him.”
Kerr addressed the comments Saturday night by telling reporters they had gotten “Andre’d.”
“Andre is one of those guys who likes to stir the pot and has a lot of cryptic messaging at times,” Kerr said. “He jokes around. I didn’t take anything from it. It’s just Andre being Andre.”
On Monday, Kerr reiterated his previous comments and maintained that he was not offended by Iguodala’s remark.
“First of all, he wasn’t talking about me, just for the record,” Kerr said. “He and I have talked, and that’ll remain private. I wasn’t the slightest bit offended. I think, as I mentioned the other night, he has a very cryptic sense of humor. Only thing I would say is, there’s certain humorous things you should say in the sanctity of the locker room, and certain humorous things you might want to keep from the media, and that was one of them, and he knows that.”
I’m going to be frank here: I don’t think there are very many black people who have not made a joking reference to the plantation when referring to their job or their boss or anything along those lines.
And let us not forget that Iguodala does work for what is referred to as a team “owner.” I will spare you the philosophical discussion on how team owners make money off their black players, trading them from plantation to plantation team to team and charging people large amounts of money to come watch the mandingo fights basketball teams face off throughout the season.
We probably aren’t ready to go there yet.
Read more at ESPN.