Anthony Edwards is a rising star in the NBA but made a very costly mistake earlier in September when he made a homophobic comment on Instagram. Those comments led to the NBA swiftly handing out a $40,000 fine to the young wing. This led to a lot of outrage by most fans, but Aaron Gordon decided to disagree with the punishment for Edwards and made a tweet with thumbs-down emojis to reflect that.
Gordon quickly deleted that tweet but has gotten a lot of negative attention for making it in the first place. On media day, Gordon got a chance to clarify his comments in front of journalists.
Aaron Gordon responds to a question about his recently deleted "thumbs down" emoji quote tweet of the news of Anthony Edwards' 40k fine for making homophobic slurs. pic.twitter.com/kZb1QaYr0B
— Joel Rush (@JoelRushNBA) September 26, 2022
“I opened up Twitter, I saw Ant [Edwards] had gotten 40k taken from him and you know, I hate seeing my brothers get money taken away from their pockets, especially if it comes down to freedom of speech things. That being said, I was ignorantly posting emojis, I did not know what he had actually said and once I did a little bit more research, you know there’s just things that you say, and freedom of speech is a real thing but what you say, there are gonna be consequences and repercussions from that. And that [$40,000] is a valid fine.”
Should The NBA Have Fined Anthony Edwards?
After Gordon’s earlier tweet, a small section of fans did believe that Edwards shouldn’t have been fined for his comments. That is a very tough stance to take in the modern day, as NBA players are ambassadors for the league.
Ant making those comments reflects poorly on the entire league and as a result, the league should be able to fine the player for making derogatory comments towards a group of people.
Thankfully, Gordon has accepted his mistake and said that the fine is appropriate for the comments Edwards made. Hopefully, he can move on from this as the Nuggets look to have a fantastic season as contenders for the NBA title.
