The NBA is a ruthless scene for even the greatest NBA legends. Nobody knows that better than Russell Westbrook, who has spent the second-half of his career hearing endless noise from the critics. Amid a rough season in Sacramento, the haters are out in force, and Westbrook’s wife, Nina, exposed the full extent of their fury. In a revealing post on X, she warned fans about the impact of betting culture and how it has normalized toxic behavior online.
“The negative effects of sports betting,” Westbrook said, “Brings out the worst in ppl smh.”
The screenshot features an email she received from a random fan, where they go off on her husband (Russell Westbrook) for essentially ruining his parlary. Besides including expletives, it finished with a death threat that left no room for interpretation.
“F*** You, wrote the fan. “Your piece of f***in sh*t husband sucks [so] f***n bad, can’t even get 1o points is pathetic. I hope you both die in a car crash, dumb b*tch.”
Nina is a former college basketball player and licensed marriage and family therapist who has been married to Russ for nearly 11 years. She’s been there for some of the best moments of his basketball career, but she’s also had to endure some of the worst, including his current tenure with the Kings.
Last night, in a blowout loss to the Magic, Westbrook scored just five points, along with zero rebounds, one assist, one steal, and zero blocks on 25.0% shooting and 16.7% shooting from three. It was one of his worst games of the season and a low point for the Kings, who are down to 15th in the West at 12-45 with 15 straight losses.
Sadly, this isn’t the first time that Westbrook and his family have been forced to deal with scrutiny. During his tenure with the Lakers, things got so bad that Nina was routinely receiving death threats until her husband was finally traded. While things have somewhat calmed down in his reduced role, the rise of sports betting certainly hasn’t helped lower the temperature.
At 37 years old, it’s unknown how much longer Russ will play, but he’ll be a free agent this summer once his $3.6 million contract expires. On his third team in three seasons, it’s anyone’s guess what the future has in store, but retirement isn’t off the table at this stage of his career. Every bad game brings threats of violence against his family, and there’s a point where it just becomes unbearable.
