NBA coaches fly at U.S. president-elect

The National Basketball Association (NBA) is sounding off U.S. President-elect Donald Trump.

Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr, Detroit Pistons coach Stan Van Gundy and San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich have made fierce criticism against the newly-elected president.

“It’s disgusting. Not basically because the Republicans won or anything, but the disgusting tenure and tone and all the comments that have been xenophobic, homophobic, racist, misogynistic,” coach Popovich who has been known for his reticence said ahead of the match against Detroit on Saturday. “I’m a rich white guy and I’m sick to my stomach thinking about it. I can’t imagine being a Muslim right now or a woman or an African-American, Hispanic, a handicapped person. How disenfranchised they might feel. For anyone in those groups that voted for him, it’s just beyond my comprehension how they ignore all that.”

On the same day, coach Van Gundy also bashed the president-elect by calling him “openly and brazenly racist and misogynistic and ethnic-centric.” He went on saying, “I don’t know how you go about it if you’re a person of color today or a Latino. Because white society just said to you again — not like we haven’t forever — but again, and emphatically, that I don’t think you deserve equality. We don’t think you deserve respect. And the same with women. That’s what we say today, as a country.”

"You look at society, look at what's popular, people are getting paid millions of dollars to go on TV and scream at each other, whether it's in sports or politics or entertainment," coach Kerr of Golden State said, likening the president-elect to the Jerry Springer Show. "I guess it was only a matter of time before it spilled into politics but, all of a sudden you're faced with a reality. The whole process has left all of us feeling disgusted and disappointed. I thought we were better than this. I thought the Jerry Springer Show was the Jerry Springer show."

Bo-Mi Im bom@donga.com