Matt Barnes Responds to Viral Outburst at Son’s Basketball Game

Former NBA star Matt Barnes went on the Dan Le Batard Show to tell his side of the story about his recent freakout at his son’s high school basketball game. Rick Strom breaks it down. Give us your thoughts in the comments below!

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We have an update on a previous story involving long time NBA player Matt Barnes, if unfamiliar. Barnes was cheering on his son in a high school basketball game against Harvard-westlake when cameras captured him, putting his hand on a high school announcer’s shoulder. Many rushed to the broadcaster’s defense and attacked Barnes for this.

Here was the call on the telecast. Working for him, said A bit of a flop. There’s no whistle. Instead, Perry gets fouled. Wow. It’s boring after our rescue. Crowds didn’t really like that one. Barnes had some choice words for the ref after the no call on the floor.

And that’s a technical. Yeah I did. Yeah. And I think also the technical and Barnes. But you also said gave one to Fisher maybe. I’m not sure. Wow. But. And then. Oh, wow. Well. Matt Barnes now is out onto the floor or not on the floor.

He’s right on the side of the floor just screaming you’re an expletive. Oh my God, Jake, I have never seen I mean I’ve never seen anything like this. I mean, that’s ridiculous. He’s out onto the floor right now and just no one’s doing anything about it.

I think he’s an NBA player, but, I mean, at a certain point, like, well, what I mean, I don’t. I don’t think that’s. Yeah, yeah. That’s the voice you hear is Jake Lancer, who’s shoulder Barnes touched. All right, we’re back.

The map boards kind of came up and just put a short hands on. Me, actually. So, I mean, I’m all good, but I kind of, I don’t know, this crowd is just this. Yeah. Speaking with Dan Lebatard, Barnes spoke on the matter. – What happened? – Why? What? What happened?

So what happened? Where we were at? I had my kids high school basketball game, and, it was a championship. And my kids team was picked to finish eighth out of eighth. And somehow they found themselves in the championship against Harvard. Westlake, who was a nationally ranked powerhouse.

So I was yelling at the refs and I yelled at the rest of my entire college career, my 15 year NBA career. I coach AAU in the summertime. I have high school boys, and I have a five year old coming down the pipeline.

So I’m going to be doing a lot of yelling at the refs. But this particular incident, this kid right here, and I will say my one mistake was putting my hand on his shoulder. A lot of people want to say, I grabbed this kid or I did this.

I literally put my hand on this kid’s shoulder because he, you know, it was almost like I was talking to my son. You know what I mean? He he told me to sit my down. And I was just like, you know, why do you feel comfortable enough to feel

Like you can tell a grown man to sit down? So, he and I had a little back and forth and, you know, again, obviously, admitting my faults to to even touch him was wrong of me. But I want to make sure it’s clear that, you know, the narrative of me is,

Is is some guy that beats up people. And I want to make sure people know I didn’t body slam this kid. I didn’t choke slam him. I didn’t do any of the sort. I literally put his my hand on his shoulder like, you know, like I was talking to one of my sons.

And again, for that touching him, I was wrong, but I just didn’t like the disrespect that came with, the entitlement where they felt like they could say anything to me. Let’s pause here. In case you missed it, Matt Barnes is defending himself, just as he did on Twitter.

When all of this went down, Jessica Oliver would write, what you all are failing to report is Matt Barnes going up to our broadcaster, a high school senior, grabbing his shoulder while questioning what he’s saying on the stream after he calls the ref a B multiple times because his son got a tech.

Shut your blank up, he wrote back. I was talking to the ref, not you or that kid that decided to say some slick blink. Don’t let that privilege Harvard Westlake blank go to your head Idgaf who your son is. The SAC Bee’s Jason Anderson also went in on Barnes, and after his

Column would go live, Barnes said, you weak A-holes are always trying to tell one side of the story, Anderson. Defending himself did not appreciate this in the slightest, and he would bark back, called you to hear your side of the story. We just wrote what’s already been widely reported and what’s on video.

Nothing personal. You know how to reach me if you want to talk, you reach out after the fact, nephew Barnes wrote back, which Anderson replied, one of my colleagues has been trying to reach you the past few days, and I’ve reached out as well.

Again, we will tell your side of the story if you tell us your side of the story. And lastly from Barnes. You the person who wrote this. That’s such an interesting way to start it. Is it you? The person who wrote the story reached out this morning

And I answered, don’t play with me. The damage is done. The headline is out there. If you really cared about the whole story, you would have called me like you did this morning. My hometown owes at least that much. You know, I was just inducted into the Sacramento Sports Hall of Fame,

And this is the next headline my hometown sees about me that’s blanked up. You know exactly what you were doing, but you wanted the whole story. After the facts and headlines. Here is more Matt Barnes on Lebatard show.

Not only did that kid say some slick stuff to me, but there was a there was a woman in the stands who actually they caught a picture of flipping me off saying, F you. And I’m just like, wow. Like, you really feel that you could just say anything to me.

And again, as you can see the video, see, I wasn’t talking to their team. I wasn’t talking to their players, their cheerleaders, their fans. I was talking to the refs. The foul calls were 25 to 9 in that game, so I was well within my right to be yelling at it.

But you know, Dan, we live in a in a world now where perception is reality and if the narrative fits and you know, I am someone who has had a background of handling business, you know, so again, I didn’t want this to get blown out of proportion.

I even hesitated speaking on it because it has it has died down. But I just want to, you know, first of all, you know, apologizing for touching this kid’s shoulder. I should have never touched him, but I did want to know why he felt comfortable

Enough to tell me to sit my ass down. And then I also wanted to know why the lady in the stands felt comfortable enough to say f you to me. The announcer. Meanwhile, Jake Lancer would tell a different side of the story to all of this.

This guy was on the court mid-game multiple times, screaming ridiculous stuff at the refs, and everyone, including myself, was looking at him. We made eye contact, and that was enough for him to come up to me and grip my shoulder with his hand. He told Jack pollen. Lancer would continue.

He said, what do you think you’re looking at? And I said, you’re screaming. You’re a turn for a female private part to the refs mid-game, while I am trying to pronounce don’t touch me. And then he said, I’ll slap the blank out of you.

On Twitter, Lancer would write, just got my hands put on at a high school basketball game. Not okay. One point that I thought was pretty interesting was Barnes Express, how he didn’t even want to touch on this and didn’t want to talk about it.

We still don’t have concrete evidence because it wasn’t picked up on the telecast of Barnes saying, I’ll slap the blank out of you. He regrets putting his hand on Lancer’s shoulder. Dan Lebatard even said what he did was wrong in doing that.

But I think the bigger issue is no one has admitted fault here. And it’s weird. We’re like awaiting this sort of closure, as we always do in finding out the facts and coming to a conclusion where at this point it is still just out in the open

And there are more questions than answers. Everyone, if there are any stories that you want to bring to our attention, whether it is the local level, collegiate level, professional level, national level that you think would be worthy of a story, and us covering.

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