As the Los Angeles Lakers continue their search for a head coach, one name that keeps popping up is former Golden State Warriors coach and current ESPN NBA announcer Mark Jackson.
Many NBA experts are wondering why the Lakers haven’t called Jackson yet for their head coaching position but there may be a reason why.
According to NBA reporter Ethan Strauss, ESPN might have killed a story about Jackson for ESPN The Magazine back in 2016 which accuses Jackson of using religious tactics to control his team while he was with the Warriors, which may have included some homophobic slurs.
Strauss said ESPN killed the 2016 feature on Jackson because they felt like it was “too incendiary.”
Reports are that Jackson believes that the devil influenced some players and that he would even lay hands on them to cast the evil spirits out. The report also claims that Jackson called Jason Collins and team president Rick Welt, both of whom are gay, “penis grabbers” and said that both are “going to hell.”
Right now, the Sacramento Kings are the only NBA team publicly interested in Jackson.
Some NBA fans were not surprised to hear about this.
Some fans seem to be skeptical, however, over the timing of this article and information after all these years.
It will be interesting to see if Mark Jackson or ESPN will comment on this story.
About Stacey Mickles
Stacey is a 1995 graduate of the University of Alabama who has previously worked for other publications such as Sportskeeda and Saturday Down South.