Stephen Jackson is among a select few from the basketball community who regularly shed light on women’s basketball. However, some of his latest opinions didn’t sit well with Jason Whitlock. According to the analyst, Jackson was racist when calling out Gayle King for being disrespectful towards University of South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley. Providing further justifications, the 2003 NBA champ clapped back at Whitlock on Instagram.
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Gayle King, a broadcaster for CBS News, admitted to Dawn Staley to have supported Caitlin Clark and her Iowa Hawkeyes to win the NCAA National Championship. Not appreciating the disrespect towards the 3-time national champion coach, Jackson called out the broadcaster,
“I don’t consider [her] black media. Y’all give her all these passes because she’s Oprah’s friend. I don’t give a f**k whose friend she is. But you cannot demean Dawn Staley like that...All the black people [were] rooting for Dawn Staley. We’re all fans of Caitlin Clark, but the way you put it, that sh*t was trash.”
Stephen Jackson calls out Gayle King after she admits to Dawn Staley that she was rooting for Caitlin Clark and Iowa over South Carolina. pic.twitter.com/b99aycOQUu
— The Art Of Dialogue (@ArtOfDialogue_) April 19, 2024
After hearing the passionate rant, Jason Whitlock believed that Cap’n Jack was being racist. Retweeting Jackson’s clip, Whitlock also called out the former for his “prison mentality”.
This is a prison mentality. Choose sides based on skin color, not values. We’ve normalized a prison worldview rather than a biblical worldview. It’s sad. We don’t even recognize the immorality and illogic. https://t.co/yPvf2F5cR2
— Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) April 19, 2024
As expected, the 46-year-old was not amused by Whitlock’s response. Before clearing the air that he wasn’t hating on Caitlin Clark, Jackson revealed that he had been a huge fan of coach Dawn Staley all his life.
Ripping apart Whitlock for coming off as an unnecessary detractor, Stephen Jackson said, “To say that I rooted for Dawn Staley over Caitlin Clark simply because she was black is the dumbest thing to say. I was a big Dawn Staley fan. What number did I wear my rookie year? 24 (same as Staley). The sad part is, you can’t go a day without hating on black people. You’re nothing but a puppet… That’s what you do, you give people confidence to hate…”
Finally, the host of ‘All The Smoke’ expressed his respect for Caitlin Clark and women’s basketball, “We give Caitlin Clark nothing but love and we’ll continue to. I have daughters that play basketball. We support the WNBA just like we support the NBA… Coming up, you gonna start seeing me wear a lot of WNBA jerseys and I will have a Caitlin Clark jersey on.”
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By the looks of it, Jackson’s earlier rant did not seem racist. He did favor Staley over Clark but had a justified reason for the same. In this argument between Jackson and Whitlock, it seems the latter has been unreasonable with his claims.
