Friday night, Shannon Sharpe was involved in an absolutely bizarre incident during a game between the Memphis Grizzlies and Los Angeles Lakers.
The altercation started when Sharpe, a Pro Football Hall of Famer and FS1 host, got into it with Memphis guard Dillon Brooks. The two began yelling at each other from across the court, before Brooks’ teammates, Ja Morant and Steven Adams, got involved and went over to confront Sharpe courtside. Other people, including Ja’s father, Tee Morant, came over and he continued the argument with Sharpe as he was being escorted away.
Somehow, Lakers star LeBron James was directly involved. Because of course he was.
James was asked about the incident after the Lakers knocked off the Grizzlies, 122-121.
LeBron on Shannon Sharpe: “I ride with Shannon 365 days — 366 on a leap year — 24/7. So that’s my guy. I always got his back. And he’s got mine. He can talk with the best of them, for sure.” pic.twitter.com/bAHMuPZkix
— Jovan Buha (@jovanbuha) January 21, 2023
“I ride with Shannon 365 days — 366 on a leap year — 24/7,” James said via Jovan Buha of The Athletic on Twitter. “So that’s my guy. I always got his back. And he got mine. He can talk with the best of them, for sure.”
Sharpe released a statement of his own, after spending halftime in the tunnel with security.
Shannon Sharpe spent halftime in the tunnel with security before returning to his seat for the third quarter. He granted ESPN a brief interview explaining what happened with the Grizzlies on his way to his seat: pic.twitter.com/XZNw6sQhEG
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) January 21, 2023
“They didn’t want the smoke, Dave,” Sharpe told NBA reporter Dave McMenamin of ESPN in a brief interview. “They do all that talking and jockeying and I ain’t about that jockeying. It started with Dillon Brooks. I said he was too small to guard LeBron. He said ‘F—‘ me. I said, ‘F—‘ you back. He started to come at me and I said, ‘You don’t want these problems.’ And then Ja came out of nowhere talking. He definitely didn’t want these problems. Then the dad came and he obviously didn’t want no problems. But I wanted anything they had. Don’t let these fools fool you now.”
The Grizzlies will return to Los Angeles on March 7. No word yet on whether Sharpe will be in attendance.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.