Former NBA player Stephon Marbury is calling out Stephen A. Smith after the ESPN pundit made critical remarks about Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving. Marbury went to Twitter to respond to Smith, who bashed Irving, saying “We are witnessing one of the most delusional athletes in American history.”
“We are witnessing one of the biggest uncle Tom’s on the planet in @stephenasmith,” Marbury said on Twitter in a reply to the pundit’s post.
Smith later spoke up on ESPN to respond to Marbury’s statement.
“I’m not going to insult Stephon Marbury,” Smith said. “I will say Stephon Marbury has had a problem with me since 2009 because we thought he was a bit bizarre when he was eating Vaseline, literally on video like it was bunch of cheeseburgers.”
Smith and some other media figures have been critical of Irving, who missed most of the NBA season because he didn’t want to follow New York’s vaccine mandate. Critics also blamed the NBA star for being a distraction to the Nets, who lost in the first-round playoff series against the Boston Celtics last week.
Irving has been speaking out against the media’s attitude toward Black athletes.
“I send shots at the puppet masters, not the puppets,” he tweeted. “All puppets do is run around society, trying to gain popularity and state opinions. What a life! My name is worth billions to these media corporations. My brothers and sisters who deal with this know exactly what I mean.”
I send shots at the puppet masters, not the puppets. All puppets do is run around society, trying to gain popularity and state opinions. What a life! 🤷🏾♂️
My name is worth billions to these media corporations. My brothers and sisters who deal with this know exactly what I mean.
— A11Even (@KyrieIrving) April 28, 2022
According to OutKick, Marbury continued to speak out against Smith when he interviewed with BallySports.
“I’m starting to think Stephen A. Smith thinks he’s a star for speaking the English language loud and obnoxious on TV,” the former New York Knicks guard said, according to OutKick. “I truly believe he’s upset that he couldn’t play ball in front of 19,000 people every night, so he reverted towards targeting (bash) people who look like him who have true intentions on earth to be real and authentic towards helping people.”