Bryant Gumbel on David Stern: Put up or Shut up

I don't know either Bryant Gumbel or his brother Greg Gumbel personally, only through TV and the news. I have always perceived that Greg, who is an NFL broadcaster, is a good guy. On the other hand, brother Bryant has always come across publicly as an arrogant jerk, at least to me. The occasional news reports on him appear to buttress that perception. Now he is in the news again with his televised comments about NBA Commissioner David Stern with its obvious racial implications.


http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2011/10/bryant-gumbel-slavery-david-stern.html

As for David Stern, I don't know him either other than the fact that he has been NBA commissioner for many years. I am writing this without going through any Google searches to see if Stern has had any racial issues or accusations in his past. I deliberately choose to do this blind, and if anyone sends me information that indicates he has racial issues, then I will simply have to eat it.

Gumbel has made a thinly-veiled accusation that Stern is a racist with a slave-owner mentality. He needs to back it up or apologize publicly. You can say that Gumbel speaks this way because the majority of players in the NBA are African-American. You can say that it is pertinent because the majority of players in the NBA are African-American. As far as I am concerned, it matters not whether all of the players in the NBA are African-American.

Stern may be an arrogant, imperious, overbearing, pompous SOB for all I know. That is not the point. Gumbel has made an accusation full of racial overtones. If he can back it up, now is the time to do so. Now is not the time, in the face of the blowback, for Gumbel to hide behind the fact that he never used the R word. His choice of words and inflection are all too obvious. Be a man Gumbel. If you think Stern is a racist, make your case. if you can't, you owe him a public apology.

I always thought that Bryant Gumbel-unlike his brother Greg- was an arrogant jerk.