Despite winning an Olympic goal medal with Team USA back in 2016, Kyrie Irving was conspicuously absent from Steve Kerr’s team heading into Paris despite putting up very strong numbers this past season. Stephen A. Smith believes he knows why.
On Friday’s edition of First Take, Stephen A. made the case that “imagery” is the reason that Kyrie got snubbed. He believes that the powers that be want certain people representing the country and that Kyrie probably rubs them the wrong way due to non-basketball issues.
“We all know that’s about imagery, that’s about Team USA, that’s about who you want representing the red, white and blue and stuff like that. We all know that. We know that ain’t about basketball all the time,” Smith said.
But Smith also made it clear that he doesn’t see Kyrie’s snub or any other player being snubbed from Team USA as a particularly big deal in comparison to Isiah Thomas’ infamous snub from the Dream Team back in the 1990s.
Stephen A. Smith on Kyrie Irving not making Team USA’s roster for the 2024 Olympics:
“We all know that’s about imagery, that’s about Team USA, that’s about who you want representing the red, white and blue and stuff like that. We all know that. We know that ain’t about… pic.twitter.com/j61Orscn74
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) May 31, 2024
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As for Kyrie’s snub, the eight-time All-Star made a lot of people mad with some of the things he said and did during his run with the Brooklyn Nets, such as highlighting an anti-Semitic documentary on Amazon back in 2021.
In the years since the falling out with the Nets, Kyrie has pretty much been a model citizen, rarely drawing attention to himself for non-basketball reasons.
That won’t be enough for Kyrie to get a chance at winning a second Olympic medal though.
Was Kyrie unjustly snubbed by Team USA?