In the middle of the game, Gregg Popovich takes the arena microphone and begs the Spurs supporters to stop jeering Kawhi Leonard.
In the latter minutes of the second quarter of their 109-102 loss of the Los Angeles Clippers, the coach of the San Antonio Spurs hurried up to the microphone at the Frost Fargo Center in Texas.
After the Spurs acquired Leonard with the No. 15 overall choice on draft night in 2011, Leonard made his NBA debut.
After seven seasons on San Antonio, Leonard was a key member of the team that won an NBA championship in 2014.
But his journey out of San Antonio wasn’t easy. During the 2017–18 season, Leonard only appeared in nine games because of a persistent quad ailment that he and the team were supposedly at odds over how to manage.
As a result, their relationship grew tense, and ultimately the Spurs traded him for the Toronto Raptors. There, he took home a championship, and he joined the Clippers in 2019.
However, the jeers on Wednesday night are not unprecedented. Ever since Leonard left the Spurs, the fans have routinely jeered him whenever he visits the city.
Popovich was infuriated by the way Spurs supporters were abusing former Spurs player Kawhi Leonard, who is currently shooting foul shots for the Clippers.
Even after the team selected French sensation Victor Wembanyama as the first overall pick at the draft earlier this year, it seems they are still not over his departure. They are long gone from the Leonard period.
Tonight, the Los Angeles Clippers and the San Antonio Spurs squared off. Every time superstar Kawhi Leonard of the Clippers touched the ball or stepped up to the free-throw line, the San Antonio crowd jeered him.
In an attempt to defuse the tension, Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich interrupted one of Kawhi’s shots with a microphone, stating, “That’s not who we are.”
The fans became even more enraged at Popovich’s plea, and the jeers grew louder when Kawhi took his second shot.
Fans in San Antonio are still grieving over Kawhi’s 2018 departure from the Spurs to play for the Toronto Raptors.
Kawhi’s departure has been met with jeers from the Spurs supporters. Since Kawhi left the Spurs in 2018, the squad has not seen any notable success.
In the meantime, Kawhi left San Antonio immediately next year and won another title. He won his second Finals MVP award while leading the Toronto Raptors to the team’s first-ever championship.
Fans in San Antonio were not amused by this because Kawhi could have accomplished the same thing by sticking with the Spurs.
Before practice, the Warriors came together and discussed a variety of topics, including the vehement remarks made earlier today by Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, who chastised Zaza Pachulia on the play that hurt Kawhi Leonard in Game 1.
As Popovich noted, Pachulia has been in the middle of a number of them, and it was evident that, although he was not happy to be the main attraction on the national talk-show circuit today, he knew he had to field questions about it, at least for the time being.
Kim, Leonard’s mother, was present to witness the jeers. She couldn’t have anticipated warmth, but she was sufficiently tested by one Spurs supporter to respond with a retort.
Even though the offending remark isn’t heard, Kim is obviously furious since she yells “asshole” to a fan across an exit.
The alleged perpetrator appears taken aback at a mother turning the animosity toward her son around on him.