A New York sports radio pushed back after receiving backlash for a rant against Karl-Anthony Towns.
After the New York Knicks lost to the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference Finals, WFAN’s Gregg Giannotti blamed Towns. He called the five-time All-Star a “loser” and said it’s “annoying” that Towns has yet to reach his full potential.
“That is their biggest problem — the guy is a loser,” Giannotti said Monday. “He’s a losing player. He complains. He is soft. He shows you flashes where he’s the best player on the court, not enough. He doesn’t play enough defense. He b*tches and moans. He is, up until this point in his career, a loser who is making $50 million.”
New York Giants Hall of Famer Carl Banks called the diatribe “genuinely pathetic.” Giannotti claimed Banks owes him money and responded to criticism from veteran sports writer Gary Myers by insisting he wasn’t taking any personal shots at Towns before taking personal shots at Myers.
Giannotti continued to defend himself on Tuesday’s show. He’s confused about why so many people didn’t appreciate him repeatedly calling an accomplished athlete a “loser.”
“I was really surprised that so many people digested this the way that they did yesterday. Where they thought that I was calling him a loser as a person,” Giannotti said. “And if you listen to exactly what I said, I’m talking strictly basketball. I say ‘losing player.'”
Credit: Brad Penner-Imagn Images
Giannotti believes his comments got “twisted” out of context because he wasn’t personally attacking Towns. He reiterated that the player is “missing something.”
“I don’t say anything about his family,” Giannotti continued. “Anything about the man that he is, anything about his personal life at all. Just talking about, in these situations, if you want to win a championship, I don’t think that he has it.”
Giannotti at least realized that the “loser” label evoked a visceral response. Even from a pure basketball perspective, it’s a dubious claim to make about someone who averaged 24.4 points and 14.4 points per game this season before making his second-straight conference finals appearance.
“It was that word that got people fired up,” Giannotti said. “Assuming that I was talking about him as an individual, which is not the case.”
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