Kendrick Perkins made headlines this week for the fight he and JJ Redick had on Tuesday’s edition of First Take. Redick accused Perkins of inserting race into the MVP debate in the NBA. Perkins maintains that he was simply pointing out the fact that 80% of the people voting for the award are white.
First Take has often been accused of manufacturing storylines and outrage in order to draw viewers both on air and online. Amin Elhassan said that those criticisms of the show may be valid, but he doesn’t think that is what was motivating Perkins.
“There’s another layer to all of this. So, ESPN hires former athletes, not because they know the game better than anybody else,” he said on Thursday’s edition of The Dan Le Batard Show. “Some of them do, but the main reason you hire former athletes, beyond the name brand recognition they come in with, is because you want to know what players think.”
Elhassan clarified that in his eyes, it isn’t a bad thing. It is smart to give viewers insight and let them see and hear what the guys at the very top of their respective sports think about the executives, teams and players they deal with. If a player-turned-analyst is willing to say something on television, there is a good chance that guy isn’t alone in that opinion amongst his peers.
He pointed to an episode of NBA Countdown in 2019. Celtics legend Paul Pierce said that he was just as good as Dwayne Wade and if he played with LeBron James and Shaquille O’Neal, he would have three titles, too. Elhassan noted that is how many players think and even if fans laugh at the assertion, they should be aware that there are plenty of players who were not as good as Pierce was that think they were better than Wade.
“What Kendrick Perkins said – reckless, incorrect, all that stuff. But there are a shit ton of players who think like that, man,” Elhassan said, relating his point back to the argument between Perkins and Redick on First Take. “That’s not an out-there opinion.”
