Knicks Coach Isiah Thomas And Baller Stephon Marbury Just Don't Get It
In his video deposition, former basketball great and current Knicks' coach Isiah Thomas uttered these words, ""A white male calling a black female a bitch is highly offensive," Thomas said. "That would have violated my code of conduct."
He should have stopped, right there! Instead, here's what happened next.
Asked if he was bothered by a black man calling a black female "bitch," Thomas said: "Not as much. I'm sorry to say, I do make a distinction.
Start paying the sistah now Isiah, cause it's OVAH!!!
In his videotaped deposition played for the jury at fired Knicks exec Anucha Browne Sanders' sexual harassment trial, Thomas said he drew a distinction between whites and blacks when it came to the B-word.
"Maybe I shouldn't go there. ... A white male calling a black female, that is wrong with me. I'm not taking that. I'm not accepting that. ... That's a problem for me."
An African-American once among the NBA's highest-ranking female executives, Browne Sanders was not taking it from anyone. She filed a $10 million suit against Thomas, his star guard Stephon Marbury, and the Knicks' parent Madison Square Garden after the Knicks fired her in December 2005.Both Thomas and Marbury are fending off her claims they used the B-word to describe her. Marbury has admitted calling Browne Sanders a bitch but denied calling her a "black bitch."
"Now, have I ever used curse words around her? Yes, but at her? No," Thomas said on the video in a packed courtroom in the second week of the widely publicized trial.
Thomas denied ever calling Browne Sanders "bitch" or "ho," as she claims. Please, no," he said when asked. "Come on." He also denied directing the F-word at her or that he was ever interested in her romantically. "I'm not attracted to her, no," Thomas said, flashing an uncomfortable smile.
The videotape was clearly the highlight of a day in which Garden lawyers had hoped to embarrass Browne Sanders on the witness stand.They spent six hours grilling the former Northwestern basketball star dressed in a pink jacket and black slacks about questionable tax deductions she took and a trail of e-mails she sent to her boss in the waning days of her five-year stint in the Garden's front office.
Thomas was so stung by the pretrial testimony he gave earlier this year that he made a rare statement as he left court. "Please don't mischaracterize the videotape shown in court today," he pleaded, insisting, "I don't think it's right for any man to call a woman a 'bitch.'"