Max Kellerman issued an apology after feeling like he may have taken the James Harden slander too far by comparing him to Donald Trump.
Kellerman went viral earlier this week for a one-liner comparing the current president of the United States to a former NBA MVP. It was a very mild joke, but it intersected sports and politics just enough to capture the public’s attention.
“Bringing in James Harden to win a championship is like electing Donald Trump to fix your country,” Kellerman said on an episode of his Game Over podcast with Rich Paul.
And after seeing the rampant reaction to his one-liner, Kellerman thought better of the analogy.
“I shouldn’t have said that because it’s not fair to James Harden,” Kellerman said on a later episode of Game Over. “I did not mean to insult him publicly in a way that was going to go viral. It was too severe. I don’t think it’s as bad as all that.
“When you make an analogy like that, you use hyperbole, you use exaggeration to make your point. So I don’t think it’s as bad as electing Trump to fix your country, but that’s the idea. That’s the opposite of what you’d do if you’re trying to get a certain result.”
This was Kellerman having some fun with seeing the analogy go viral, more than it was an actual apology to Harden. Because let’s face it, when the Cavaliers traded for Harden, everyone thought they acquired a good player, but no one thought it gave them a championship pedigree. And with the Cleveland Cavaliers down 2-0 to the New York Knicks in the Eastern Conference Finals, Harden has done little to flip the narrative.
Most sports hosts reconcile with the fact that they will be disliked by half their audience. But Kellerman probably angered both sides of this analogy. James Harden doesn’t want to be compared to Donald Trump, a president whose approval rating has dipped to 31 percent, the lowest of either of his presidencies. And Trump equally doesn’t want to be compared to an NBA player who has a history of coming up small in the biggest moments, even if the analogy makes sense.
About Brandon Contes
Brandon Contes is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. He previously helped carve the sports vertical for Mediaite and spent more than three years with Barrett Sports Media. Send tips/comments/complaints to bcontes@thecomeback.com