Portland Trail Blazers star point guard Damian Lillard is not happy with Denver Nuggets radio host Scott Hastings, who had some unprofessional things to say about Jusuf Nurkic in Game 6 up in Portland.
After the Blazers iced Game 6 over the Nuggets, Hastings said someone should “kick Nurkic in the shin” because he was playing the role of tough guy on the bench. Nurkic, of course, suffered a devastating compound fracture of his right leg in late March, ending his season.
Lillard says the comment by Hastings was “BS.”
"It's unacceptable and it's BS. Hopefully there's some consequences" @Dame_Lillard on the Nuggets analyst who said to kick @bosnianbeast27 in the shin #RipCity pic.twitter.com/k72JI3PwWO
— Orlando Sanchez (@orlandokgw) May 11, 2019
This certainly isn't a good look for Hastings, nor his partner, Jason Kosmicki. Audio of their comments, courtesy of NBC Sports Northwest, is below.
"Kick him in the shin."
Denver Nuggets radio analyst Scott Hastings says in reference to @bosnianbeast27 "playing tough guy" on the #Blazers bench.
It was met with laughter by play by play announcer Jason Kosmicki.#ripcity #MileHighBasketball pic.twitter.com/myqKiUJKpy
— NBC Sports Northwest (@NBCSNorthwest) May 10, 2019
Damian Lillard and the Blazers are hoping there will be some consequences coming Hastings' way. The Nuggets would be well-served to address this incident in-house. It also bears reminding that Nurkic played for Denver before being traded to the Blazers in 2017, and didn't always endear himself to the Nuggets.
The Blazers and Nuggets play Game 7 of their series on Sunday in the Mile High City. The winner goes to the Western Conference Finals to take on the Golden State Warriors. You can expect the Blazers to come out with more fight in Game 7 after hearing those insensitive comments by Hastings. There's no place in sports for what he said.
Lillard is averaging 27.2 points per game in the series against the Nuggets. The Blazers' best player put up 32 points in Game 6 and finally shot the ball well from beyond the arc, going 6-of-13 from beyond the arc in Game 6.
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