The following message is brought to you by a lifelong Chicagoan, member of the Chicago Bulls media corps and lifelong Bulls fan.
There was a time, not very long ago, when the Bulls’ biggest and fiercest rival was the Detroit Pistons. The rivalry still lives on to some extent today, just on much a smaller scale. I’m not saying Bulls fans need to trade in their red and black for red, white and blue of the Pistons, but they should support Pistons Coach Stan Van Gundy.
All fans, of all NBA teams, should show support for Stan Van Gundy.
Following a brutal, lopsided loss to the Los Angeles Clippers, Van Gundy aired his grievances to the press when asked about the Tuesday night Presidential election and newly elected president Donald Trump.
Here is a link to a snippet. To hear the entire speech, check out the Detroit Free Press Soundcloud embedded below.
“I don’t think anybody can deny this guy is openly and brazenly racist and misogynistic,” Van Gundy said. “We have just thrown a good part of our population under the bus, and I have problems with thinking this is where we are as a country.”
“Martin Luther King said, ‘The arc of the moral universe is long, but bends toward justice.’ I would have believed in that for a long time, but not today. … What we have done to minorities … in this election is despicable. I’m having a hard time dealing with it. This isn’t your normal candidate. I don’t know even know if I have political differenceswith him. I don’t even know what are his politics. I don’t know, other than to build a wall and ‘I hate people of color, and women are to be treated as sex objects and as servants to men.’ I don’t know how you get past that. I don’t know how you walk into the boothand vote for that.”
“It’s embarrassing. I have been ashamed of a lot of things that have happened in this country, but I can’t say I’ve ever been ashamed of our country until today. Until today. We all have to find our way to move forward, but that was — and I’m not even trying to make a political statement. To me, that’s beyond politics.”
Stan Van Gundy Goes on 6 Minute Rant on “Racist” Trump (Audio) https://t.co/LCuGMMOvAl via @Quierra_Luck pic.twitter.com/wVmX1exJYv
— Robert Littal BSO (@BSO) November 10, 2016
https://twitter.com/ayykaygee/status/796466008219262978
Kudos to Stan Van Gundy for expressing the truth, seeing the greater perspective of it all and simply just tell it like it is. He’s right that this isn’t even really about politics, it’s instead about decency and tolerance. It’s not Republicanism, or even Conservatism that he’s backlashing against, it’s simple hatred and bigotry.
Also big time props to Van Gundy for pointing what horrifying hypocrites the Evangelicals are. We always knew that the voting block of Evangelicals were always full of it, but this time they exposed themselves in a worse way than ever before.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous radio and television talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram and Sound Cloud.