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Russell Westbrook Explains Heated Exchange With Utah Jazz Fan

It wasn’t the first time that Russell Westbrook had been involved in an incident with a Utah Jazz fan, but it may have been the worst incident at the Salt Lake, yet.

Westbrook is being approached by hecklers quite often, maybe because he’s one of the few players who has never been one to put up with everything, therefore regularly reacting to the hecklers, but when it comes to racial slurs, a line is crossed by fans that requires repercussions.

According to Westbrook, the heckling fan he approached during last night’s game between the Thunder and Jazz, disrespected him racially:

“Obviously, everybody’s talking about the same video. The realization of it is how it started is the young man with his wife in the stands told me to get down on my knees like you’re used to. To me, that’s completely disrespectful. To me, I think it’s racial. I think it’s just inappropriate in the sense that there’s no protection for the players.

I think there are a lot of great fans around the world that like to come to the game and enjoy the game. There are people that come to the game to say mean, disrespectful things about me, my family. For many years, I’ve done all the right things. I’ve never done anything to hurt or harm anybody. I’ve never been in any trouble, never fought a fan. Been in the league 11 years – clean slate, humble. I’ll take whatever, all the criticism from everybody. I’ve been doing the same thing for years. For me, disrespect will not be taken from me. I completely just sit back sometimes and just take it.

That’s just one video, but throughout the whole game, since I’ve been here, especially here in Utah, a lot of disrespectful things have been said. For me, I’m just not going to continue to take disrespect for my family. I just think there’s got to be something done. There’s got to be some consequences for those type of people that come to the game just to say and do whatever they want to say. I don’t think it’s fair to the players – not just to me, but I don’t think it’s fair to the players.

And if I had to do it again, I would say the same exact thing, because I truly will stand up for myself, for my family, for my kids, for my wife, for my mom, for my dad every single time. I expect anybody else to do the same. So that’s kind of where I’m at with the whole situation. As for beating up his wife, I have never put my hand on a woman; I never will. Never been in any domestic violence before. Never have before, but once he said the comment, his wife repeated the same thing to me as well. So that’s kind of how that started. I know you guys only got the tail end of the video, but the start of the video is way more important and way more disrespectful than what you guys heard. So appreciate y’all.”

Russell Westbrook explains the verbal altercation he had with Jazz fans during tonight's game, saying fans told him “to get down on my knees like you used to.” (via @espn_macmahon) pic.twitter.com/aObvg6ZuPT

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) March 12, 2019