WNBA coach Becky Hammon refuses to apologize for her Jalen Brunson take.
In 2023, Hammon said that Brunson was not a “1A dude” and said that if your best player is small, you aren’t going to win on ESPN’s “NBA Today.” She doubled down on her take in late May and questioned why everyone was so stuck on it.
Despite Brunson winning Finals MVP and leading the Knicks to a title, she still refused to apologize for her take on Tuesday.
“Jalen, all he did was prove history wrong. He proves he’s an outlier,” Hammon said after the Aces’ shootaround, according to the New York Post. “So you can put his name next to Steph Curry and Isiah Thomas, and I thought he played brilliantly, especially down the stretch.”
“I mean, he was that 1A dude,” Hammon said. “But apologize, I’m never gonna apologize for having an opinion. That’s what ESPN pays me for.”
Brunson, who is 6-foot-2, scored 45 points in the Knicks’ championship-sealing 94-90 win over the San Antonio Spurs in Game 5 and cemented himself as one of the best players in franchise history.
The Knicks’ captain then appeared to address Hammon’s comments during the Knicks parade last week when speaking in front of City Hall.
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“There’s a lot of people who have a lot of negative stuff to say,” Brunson said. “There’s a lot of people who have their own opinions. But when you prove them wrong, you don’t have to say s–t to them. They don’t deserve it.”
While Brunson may not have directly addressed Hammon, she has been the subject of ire among Knicks fans for her now-infamous take. Hammon then offered another take on Brunson to “piss off Knicks fans again.”
“Let me just piss off Knicks fans again and say, I think he’s the greatest Knick ever,” Hammon said. “Give them something else to talk about. … I’ve always been a Jalen Brunson fan. I was a fan of his at Villanova, in Dallas, and why this comment went off the rails, I have no idea because it was clearly a historical and analytical take.”
When she doubled down in May, she said she was up for being “being proven wrong.”
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Brunson just concluded his fourth season with the team, but has already turned himself into a franchise icon.
In four seasons with the Knicks, Brunson has averaged 26 points, 5.3 assists and 3.2 rebounds per game. He has made the All-Star team three times in his four seasons and was named the NBA’s Clutch Player of the Year last season.
In the NBA playoffs, Brunson has taken his game to another level. He has averaged 29.4 points, 5.5 assists and 3.7 rebounds in four playoff runs with the Knicks and helped the Knicks end their 53-year playoff drought.
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