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Jaylen Brown: Players have ‘expressed discomfort’ with conditions Kyrie Irving must meet to be reinstated
Brown said that he expects the NBPA to appeal Irving's "no less than five game" suspension.
Celtics star and National Basketball Players Association vice president Jaylen Brown said Monday that the players union has issues with the terms set by the Brooklyn Nets in regard to Kyrie Irving’s return from his suspension.
Irving was given six requirements that he must meet in order to return from a “no less than five game” suspension as a result of his repeated refusal to apologize or condemn antisemitism after sharing a link to an antisemitic movie on his Twitter page. He did offer an apology on Instagram after the Nets set the conditions on Thursday.
Brown told the Boston Globe that, based on those conditions, as well as the lack of guidelines addressing social media posts in the league’s collective bargaining agreement, he expects the NBPA to appeal the suspension.
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“There is an interesting distinction between what somebody says verbally and what somebody posts as a link on a platform with no description behind it,” Brown told the Globe. “Some people will argue there’s no difference and some people will argue there is a difference. There’s no language in our CBA. There’s no rules against it. This is uncharted territory for everybody, and everybody is trying to figure out the difference between the two.”
Brown said that the requirements Irving must meet “seem like a lot,” and “a lot of the players expressed discomfort” with them.
“[Irving] made a mistake. He posted something. There was no distinction,” Brown went on to say. “Maybe we can move forward, but the terms in which he has to fulfill to return, I think not just speaking for me, speaking as a vice president from a lot of our players, we didn’t agree with the terms that was required for him to come back…”
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He also said that Irving and NBA Commissioner Adam Silver would be meeting on Tuesday, hopefully bringing clarity to both Irving’s future and the NBA’s policy on social media expression.
Brown emphasized that, while Irving made a mistake, he does not think his former teammate is antisemitic.
“I don’t believe Kyrie Irving is antisemitic. I don’t think people in our governing bodies think he’s antisemitic. He made a mistake,” Brown said. “We understand from an outside perspective how important sensitivity is to not condone hate speech and not condone anything of that nature. It’s sensitivity to the dialect around that. We don’t want to stand up for somebody in order to not condemn hate speech, but I don’t believe Kyrie Irving is antisemitic. And hopefully the NBA feels the same way.”
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