Gregg Popovich is the Head Coach of the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs. As the Spurs Head Coach, he is ninth all time in wins and is third all time in championships. He will be inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame after his coaching career is over.
Popovich is a Veteran who matriculated at the Air Force Academy. After his graduation, he worked with Air Force Intelligence gathering and analyzing data regarding the Soviet Union. He also played basketball and coached for the Air Force Academy.
A couple days after the election Popovich gave an elegant, brutal take down of Trump:
“I’ve spoken on this before and I probably will again. Right now I’m just trying to formulate thoughts. It’s still early and I’m still sick to my stomach. Not basically because the Republicans won or anything, but the disgusting tenor and tone and all the comments that have been xenophobic, homophobic, racist, misogynistic, and I live in that country where half the country ignored all that to elect someone. That’s the scariest part of the whole thing to me.
“It’s got nothing to do with the environment and Obamacare and all that other stuff. We live in a country that ignored all those values that we would hold our kids accountable for. They’d be grounded for years if they acted and said the things that have been said in that campaign by Donald Trump. I look at the evangelicals and I wonder, ‘Those values don’t mean anything to them?”…
“What gets lost in the process are African-Americans and Hispanics and women and the gay population, not to mention the eighth grade developmental stage exhibited by him when he made fun of the handicapped person. I mean, come on. That’s what a seventh-grade, eighth-grade bully does, and he was elected president of the United States. We would’ve scolded our kids, we would’ve have discussions and talked until we were blue in the face trying to get them to understand these things, and he is in charge of our country. That’s disgusting.”…
“One could go on and on. We didn’t make this stuff up. He’s angry at the media because they reported what he said and how he acted. It’s ironic to me. It just makes no sense. So that’s my real fear and that’s what gives me so much pause and makes me feel so badly that the country is willing to be that intolerant and not understand the empathy that’s necessary to understand other group situations.”
After tonight’s game, Popovich was again asked about Trump and he absolutely torched the stubby-fingered vulgarian again:
Some snippets:
"The march today was great. The message is important. It could have been a whole lot of groups marching. Somebody said on TV, 'What's the message?' The message is obvious. Our president comes in with the lowest rating of anybody whoever came into the office. There's a majority of people out there, since Hillary won the popular vote, that don't buy his act.
"I just wish he was more ... had the ability to be mature enough to do something that really is inclusive, rather than just talking and saying, 'I'm going to include everyone.' He could talk to the groups that he disrespected and maligned during the primary and really make somebody believe it. But so far, you've gotten to the point where you really can't believe anything that comes out of his mouth. You really can't. All those thousands that were on the rooftops after 9/11? There were two. 'We went to Hawaii and checked his birth certificate and my investigators couldn't BELIEVE what they found.' There wasn't anything there. It's over and over again.
"The CIA today, instead of honoring the 117 people behind him where he was speaking, he talked about the size of the crowd. That's worrisome. That's worrisome. I'd just feel better if someone was in that position that showed the maturity and psychological and emotional level of someone that was his age. It's dangerous and it doesn't do us any good.
"I hope he does a great job. But there's a difference between respecting the office of the president and the person who occupies it. That respect has to be earned. It's hard to be respectful of someone when we all have kids, and we're watching him be misogynistic and xenophobic and racist and make fun of handicapped people.
"And what really bothers me are the people around him, the Sean Spicers, the Kellyanne Conways the Reince Preibuses, who know who he is and actually have the cynical approach and disingenuous attitude to really defend him and make him look like he didn't say what he said. When he's mad at the media for them reporting what he said, it just boggles my mind. When Kellyanne Conway said the other day he wasn't really making fun of the handicapped person. It's incredible. It really makes you wonder how far would someone go to actually cover for somebody that much. I think the comment was,' You have to look in his heart. You don't know what's in his heart. He wouldn't do that.' But he did it."And all the things he said during that time, if our children would have said it, we would have grounded them for six months. Without a doubt. But we ignore all that, because ... because why? That says something about all of us. And that's what's dangerous. That's what scares the hell out of me to this day and makes me uneasy.
Bravo Mr. Popovich. Bravo.