After using an anti-Semitic slur during a Twitch live stream yesterday, injured Heat reserve center Meyers Leonard will be “away from the team indefinitely,” the team announced in a statement (via Twitter).
Leonard issued an apology today for his comment, as Shams Charania of The Athletic tweets.
“While I didn’t know what the word meant at the time, my ignorance about its history and how offensive it is to the Jewish community is absolutely not an excuse and I was just wrong,” he said. “This is not a proper representation of who I am and I want to apologize to the Arisons, my teammates, coaches, front office, and everyone associated with the Miami Heat organization, to my family, to our loyal fans and to others in the Jewish community who I have hurt.”
After re-signing with the Heat for a guaranteed $9.4MM during the 2020 offseason, Leonard appeared in just three games before suffering a season-ending shoulder injury.
The NBA and the Heat announced earlier today that they were reviewing the offending video clip in which Leonard uttered the slur as he played ‘Call of Duty: Warzone’ on Twitch. The Heat have since indicated they’ll let the league take the lead on the probe.
“The words used by Meyers Leonard were wrong and we will not tolerate hateful language from anyone associated with our franchise,” the team said. “The Miami Heat will cooperate with the NBA while it conducts its investigation.”
The Heat’s contract with Leonard also includes a $10.1MM team option for the 2021/22 season. That option was always a long shot to be picked up — now, given the big man’s injury and this off-court incident, it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which it’ll be exercised.
In before Tatsumaki starts defending the use of racial slurs again.
You’d think with his handle. He’d understand hateful language. Ignorance is not an excuse. Good he apologized.
@rct someone as woke as you should have better burns. You let me down with this one. Do better.
Tats when your have your own fan base talking about you without even commenting lol….
I guess rct doesn’t make mistakes in life.
Rct throws rocks from a glass house. He makes mistakes as do we all they just aren’t on camera.
The guys dumb (Leonard) no doubt but to say we don’t all make mistakes verbally is wrong and a lie. Just sayin
@Tatsu: Yeah, no. Sorry. I don’t use racial slurs.
You’ve never once in your entire life used bigoted language of any kind? Not once? Never said anything that would offend someone?
Tatsumaki, are you one of those ‘no sin is greater than another’ people? Why so disingenuous about the situation?
Of course, everyone makes mistakes, but comparing use of a racial slur to, say, cursing at one’s parents during a heated argument is false equivalency.
I hope Leonard doesn’t catch too much hell, by the way.. At least his apology comes off as sincere. Hopefully the words are his own.
Swearing at your parents during an argument isn’t a sin hahahahaha, Meyers is dumb for sayin a word he didn’t know the origins of or a word he knew was wrong, but I’m not sure he planned on Holocaust 2.0 with his language, we have become the softest people on earth, we have no primal survival skills and we are tripping cause some dumb jock did a dumb jock thing, absolutely we are the softest generation
Everyone would like to announce that rct has never used a racial slurs in jest once in his life.
Sadly the statement above was a lie it just wasn’t caught on camera.
Are you Tatsumaki’s burner account? I find it odd that you’re both saying the exact same thing using the exact same words. Calling it a ‘mistake’, saying ‘caught on camera’, saying everyone uses racial slurs in private (newsflash: they don’t). Also suspicious that both of your comments get instant upvotes.
All racists think everyone uses slurs in private, when only racists do, the majority of people do not, because its actually REALLY easy to simply not use hateful slurs! Just call someone a coward, its usually what a person who uses slurs means anyway….
free speech application notwithstanding, people in such the public eye have ti be smarter. you have toe expect its going to be noticed and bother someone, and you know the team isnt going to like how it represents them.
misspelled “to” twice in a row. geez im a mess.
You might be a mess, but your sentiment was solid.
At least you embraced diversity and misspelled it two different ways.
I thought thia site disabled commenting on topics like this
That’s only the baseball site. Most commenters here are far less juvenile. Plus, Luke is much more cool.
God, a lot of the comments on MLBTR are just deplorable
Deplorable is 100% the right word
Baseball boards are filled with either trolls, the angriest people you’ve ever met, people who dont actually even seem to like the sport of baseball, and now a boatload of 14 yr olds that are passing as know it all prodigies
MLBTR actually use to be a good place to talk baseball, now its almost impossible….. Seems to taken a huge turn for the worse after Covid hit. Most of the good posters just up and left at this point
While some might find these last 2 Leonard articles cringy in the comment sections, there has been more civil conversation than you would ever find on MLBTR in 100 years …. Im glad they didnt shut them down and Im even more Glad that there can civil discourse by the posters inside this arena
I quit commenting there altogether. Nothing good came from it. Here even if I say something pretty dumb or controversial, people are usually civil.
Yea I remember you there HiFlew, you were one of the smarter ones, just had troubles relating to the mob’s dubious takes
Trust me I can relate, that place just gets really ugly that you can kinda see yourself getting ugly as well….. I peek in occasionally still, but there’s not much digestible even tho they get 10x the comments as Hoops . MLBTR articles are still top notch tho
I appreciate that. I tried to be civil for the most part, but you are 100% correct that the mob tends to drag you down far more often than you lift them up.
I still go there for the articles, although they have gotten a bit too “Fangraphy” for my tastes, but I avoid the comments section altogether.
Ha, the fangraphy comment also hits way too close for home- I actually defected from fangraphs to MLBTR bc of the changes and viewpoints Fangraphs made/materialized about 3 years ago (Miss Meggy) …..Things were going well at MLBTR until about Covid in my estimation ; where too much time available and too many of the wrong people circulated the arena – I still think the writers are top notch tho, especially Steven Adams
They stopped the wanna-be Fangraph articles. I like to think that my and others’ comments encouraged them to stop, because we were all saying: MLBTR is good at reporting on transactions and that’s why we’re here, not analytics-driven opinion pieces. There is already enough of that elsewhere, and MLBTR’s are definitely nothing special. Now when they do long-form/opinion pieces which aren’t based on news stories/rumors, they’re about actual transactions: trade candidates, trade retrospectives, etc. and those actually fit in with what they’re trying to do.
Though there are still elements of MLBTR’s writing style that bug me, and I don’t see the Hoops Rumors writers doing the same stuff which is nice. And yes, the commenters here are just immeasurably better. There are bad takes here and there, but you never see the crap like you saw on the article where MLBTR reported that Cleveland would be changing their name.
How to destroy your career in one word. Don’t worry he can go to the Russian league.
Let’s see how it works out. But, even if what he said is wrong and deserves an apology and probably a fine/suspension, I tend to think it shouldn’t be more severely punished than e.g. pointing a pregnant woman with a gun.
“Even if” it is wrong? You have a good point, but is that really the best way to say that?
Ok, let me express it in a clearer way: “although what he said is indeed wrong” :-)
Sorry wasn’t trying to be a jerk, just showing how easy it can be to nitpick language and make someone appear bad.
I’m not saying that is the case with Leonard, who clearly screwed up, but it can be the case sometimes.
I love the irony of condemning a racist statement while denigrating an entire population in the next sentence.
Leonard just had his “LiAngelo moment”. Good for him he, somewhat inexplicably, fared quite well (in purely economic terms) in the league for several years before the meltdown.
He can kiss his $10M option goodbye. Miami will save another $15M after the season by not picking up Iggy’s option either. Maybe that’s enough to pay Dipo.
They should trade both for Drummond, plus 2nd rd pick.
Any discipline from twitch?
I could see maybe a 1 week ban, but it’s unlikely anything more than that, although I doubt he’ll go back on twitch any time soon
That’s disappointing. Last year my kid was telling me how he was playing CoD with him online and said he was cool. And then this…
The ignorance within the cancel culture that exists is unbelievable. Myers Leonard may be ignorant but he is no racist. He was also injured and never returning to the Heat, they should understand his demonstrated non-bigoted conduct and support him like he has the Heat. With enthusiasm. Scumbags support this type of character lynching.
Is “cancel culture” just a phrase that people use when there’s backlash against a famous person or company for doing something wrong? I fail to see how that’s a bad thing. It’s not a recent thing either. We’ve been holding famous people more accountable for decades.
@bed it’s only cancel culture when one side gets canceled. See nick cannon and many others of the minority variety….
For those that don’t know nick cannon actively supports anti-Jewish sentiments hence why he was fired, only to be brought back shortly after a “timeout”
what do you mean by “one side”? Liberals? Minorites? And just because someone was later forgiven doesn’t mean they were never held accountable (or “cancelled”). In baseball, those who admitted using steroids and apologizing were initially “cancelled” but people forgave them after apologies (see: ARod). And others never admitted or apologized and are still “cancelled” (see: Sosa). We didn’t call it “cancelling” back then, but to me this is the same.
sorry, re-read your comment. I should have asked if you meant “white people” or conservatives when you said “one side”.
Bed Bath – Doesnt really pertain to Og post but baseball still has racism under the hood……. Steroids is still predominately linked to Barry Lamar Bonds as if he created it himself in a lab .
Meanwhile Mark McGwire wags his finger at Congress under oath (lying) and he’s an afterthought today
@bed: What these people want is no consequences for their actions. They want to be coddled and told everything is OK and that they could never do any wrong. They want to be treated like children.
‘Cancel culture’ is a myth. Theses people just want to complain about facing consequences.
Yeah, I think people throw around the word “cancel culture” too easily without examining what it is. A restaurant down the street has terrible food and a 2-star rating on Yelp with lots of bad reviews. Are they being “cancelled”? Sounds to me like they are. Is that a bad thing? To me it’s not because people will know they have bad food and won’t waste their money.
“Cancel culture” is a buzzword created by right wingers who are trying to avoid any kind of retribution or responsibility for wanting hate speech to be normalized. No one who is a good person actively hates “cancel culture” – I prefer being called a “responsibility enjoyer” anyway.
A grown man uses a slur in a public forum and people like you – yes I said people like you – defend him with idiotic buzz words like “cancel culture” and “character lynching.” I’d feel bad for you, but you’re not worth that. Have a great day.
If you didn’t read it the first time, the part about lynchers and scumbags, read again. Calling lynchers, scumbags isn’t defending or claiming Myers Leonard is innocent or guilty of anything. Ignorant, not bigoted or racist. There is a difference.
Dude is getting more flack than Desean Jackson and Nick Cannon from their anti-Semitic remarks last year.
Only white people can be racist. You know that
I’m baffled people genuinely believe that. There doesn’t have to be a history of oppression against white people for non white people to be racist.. Guess what, if a non white person hates all white people for whatever reasons they may have, they are a racist.
Facts. Want to guess the difference?
I’m guessing it’s got to do with race?
Randy Orton said ***** on twitch last year and nobody cared. Dwyane Wade just defended the second dude, or something along those lines b/c I barely remember it and didnt care at the time b/c I dont even know who the guy is, and he got crucified for it. White people 1000% still get away with more racist, xenophobic, etc sh!+ than anyone. That’s as obvious as it gets, and I know I’ll regret having responded to this, but the underlying answer is that the whole idea is dumb b/c people pick and choose the lives they want to ruin, in general, and it’s usually the rich people/elites that get away with it, or people doing things for them. Of course there are double standards, but I dont see that as an advantage for minorities. It’s insane how distracted people get having to stroke their ego and entitlement b/c of social media, focusing on people that shouldnt matter, as if its news, instead of actually fighting the people ****ing them to their faces. Again, there are egregious situations where peoples character should probably be questioned, but the way people decide what those things are, in general, is also questionable, and also isnt an advantage to minorities
Once again, I am absolutely baffled why any famous person wants anything to do with social media. The downside just seems to be so much worse than any upside.
This guy has probably cost himself millions of dollars, will probably lose his lucrative career and will now forever be branded a racist. But at least he got to be seen playing a video game.
Probably makes bank on twitch and enjoys the community. That being said, social media is one of the worst things that ever existed, so I’m not arguing with that part
I still believe it isn’t worth it to “make bank on twitch” when you are already signed to a $9.4 million contract this year. It’s fine if you are a college freshman with too much time on your hands, but a professional NBA player with millions of dollars in hand doesn’t need a second job.
Especially if you’re a marginal player like Leonard. It’s easier to cut you than deal with the fallout.
@hiflew – you got it man, social media has been a disaster for the human race. Regular old anon internet, such as these comment threads, are the last pockets of the internet where we can say anything without retribution. Which makes it doubly weird when anon commenters here follow other anon commenters around over different posts to call them out on “hypocrisy” when its sports: takes change by the second as new info comes to light. New post = new takes – I personally dont really care about what was said on here in the past – only in the now. Well, other than the rockets fan on here who changed their screen name 100 times because they cant understand their team is actually terrible and was rebuilding from the second Harden was traded, lol forever at that dude…
I don’t even know what he said means …
I know me neither. I haven’t heard that word in years, and maybe only 10 times in my whole life. How does a guy under 30 know what it means? Is it an East Coast thing?
Of course I’m in California so maybe that’s why it’s not familiar to me? But how does a guy 29 years old know that word is in the first place? Where does he learn that? I would think it would be only bitter old guys that would be familiar with the phrase?
Oh well, I hope he learns from this.. and kindly drops the f-bombs while he’s at it. It’s amazing how f-bombs are common vernacular today on Twitter and all the youth. I know I might catch Flack for this but that pulls my chain as well. Why does everybody have to be a potty mouth? Just because Draymond Green is a potty mouth do all the reporters on Twitter have to quote him exactly? Jeepers.
My guess would be there’s a decent chance he didn’t know what it meant and was just repeating it from other people on twitch
Online gaming is notoriously NOT PC and my bet is the K word flies around a lot more there than almost anywhere else in American society
No, that doesn’t excuse it, but I also think we can view incidents like these with nuance rather than “Person X said the word we can’t say, ipso facto they should lose their career, be boycotted, wear a scarlet letter, etc.”
Furthermore, no amount of social shaming is going to cure the entire populace from ignorance. People can sit and say, “I’ve never said anything offensive,” yet that’s a statement the SPEAKER can never prove. The listener gets offended, not the speaker. And the listener may not inform you what you said at one point in your life was offensive to them.
Bottom line, we all have our cultural blind-spots, and we all have prejudices to differing degrees. Recognizing that is the first step to a more civil society. The holier than thou approach, frankly, is not.
Gaming culture has also been a total disaster for the human race. Nothing good has come of it, at all.
What a silly person. Ruined his life. His very attractive wife will be looking for the divorce lawyer in good time. All over a video game. Nothing wrong with playing them as a grown man but going on streams like that as a famous person is asking for trouble
As a Heat fan, and technically a Jew, I honestly dont care about what he said. It was just really, really stupid. Also F the person that clipped that in his chat. That being said, he should know that dumb*** trash people sit in peoples chat waiting for any moment they can clip and post on reddit or whatever. Still, in my opinion, 1 action doesnt define a person. People make mistakes. Obviously, there are certain things that egregiously go past that, and someone’s character deserves to be in question. 1 thing, though, shouldnt ruin peoples lives or careers, and I’m sick of stuff like this being a thing. Again, he was super dumb for doing it in this “society” we live in, but I dont know Meyers Leonard personally, so I dont make judgements on his character. The only thing I can say is I had a good interaction with him last year, 1 that I’ll likely remember for a long time for a couple of hilarious reasons; people in Miami and Portland seem to love him and his wife, I never thought Portland should sign him to the deal he got, and I’ve been wanting him traded for over a year, while he has been productive for the Heat when healthy. So with all that being said, hopefully they can still move his expiring. He wanted to stay here, likely for less money, but I dont think that happens, at this point, regardless of what happens with Olynyk, b/c that’s just how this world is now.
Also, not that it matters, and not that it would be any kind of excuse for obvious reasons, I partially believe him on not knowing the meaning. I had personally never heard it until at least high school, in the mid-2000s, and possibly later than that, but that’s probably b/c I went to a mostly Jewish school before that, even though I spent most of my time in the complete opposite areas, mostly playing sports back then before my injuries. I have however seen some random Call of Duty videos, and it makes old school xbox live sound like sesame street, which is saying a lot. That word was literally every second or third word by the children playing those games nowadays. It’s possible he had only ever heard it playing the game, and really thought it was a game thing, even though, again, that isnt really an excuse.
What makes it look worse was the hesitation before he said it, implying he thought about it for a second and that was the first thing he thought to say, or he knew what he was about to say, knew it was a bad idea to say it, but decided to say it quickly and then move on with what he was doing as quickly as possible, in hopes nobody that cared caught it, possibly for a couple of chuckles from his chat, or maybe even a petty way to call back at the person that likely said it during the game a bunch of times previously. Then he came out with an apology where he prefaces it by saying it wasnt his fault
Louder for people on the back like rct!!!
I wasn’t aware that he attempted to dodge responsibility. I’d possibly revoke my previous comment if possible. Oh well.
Poor Leonard. Some backlash is fully expected after his online slip-up.
Not defending the guy, but just the sheer amount that he’s gotten this past 24 hours, has been mind-boggling ……. you’d think he assaulted an old Asian man down his street.
The HEAT constructed these 1+1 contracts, among them Leonard, to have flexibility this ’21 offseason.
It’s almost certain now that Leonard never gets to play with the HEAT again. Looking on the bright-side for him, if he turns his back to hoops completely, he can play COD all day, in a nice pad down the bay.
What is sad is the double standard. If this was against a different demographic, people like,lebron, Irving, etc would have been calling for this kids head. Do we hear anything from anyone else.
Anti semitism is so forgiven in our culture it’s disgusting. All people have to do is say they are sorry and it’s all forgiven.
But if this was against a different demographic, he would have been released within an hour and never to play again
Sports needs to hold ALL hate speech to the same level no matter if the kid says they are sorry or what.. no matter who it’s against.
Yes it’s interesting the silence from the other players. Where’s Lebron?
I agree. There’s long been an obvious different set of standards ……. right of the bat for hoops, I don’t recall any such blowback when Harrell or LaMelo (context aside) said racial slurs.
Again not defending Leonard, but with the sheer amount of outrage he’s getting, you’d think he just assaulted an old Asian guy down the street, without a facemask on.
Off the topic. It’s not anti Semitic, it’s anti Jewish. There’s a difference. We get that confused in today’s society. Jordan Maxwell, who is an expert in ancient religion discussed the topic.
If someone is truly “anti Semitic”, they are against thirteen races of people. Arabs are Semitic. It’s a small point in this discussion but holds some weight in the way people use words and terms today.
What a waste…
Some really great takes in here from all sides and posters ; impressed, hat tip to Hoops Rumors for having faith in the community leaving it open. I have enjoyed reading all these posts and counters and have learned some valuable info as well doing so
I hope Leonard {eventually} gets a chance at redemption, thats all I’ll say
One of the few sensible posters here. Hat tip to you, I personally can’t stand when people act as if they don’t make mistakes in life. Leonard did and I hope it doesn’t cost him his career
Tats, I disagree, I’ve read many sensible posts on both sides of the isle, and the respect that’s been shown by differing opinions/posters to one another is pretty impressive for an internet message board on such a sensitive subject
These topics are never my cup of tea really, much prefer the vanilla X’s & O’s articles. Its a good sign too see them not become a complete disaster tho and even learn a thing or two in the meanwhile
I think it comes down to people’s attention spans and hidden motives.
Leonard could’ve secretly been mad at someone and let this slip out accidentally on purpose. That or he really did make a mistake.
Either way, he apologized. Assign a set punishment. Everyone moves on with their lives.
The Heat have been looking for a reason to drop him since his injury and performance thus far. Their reaction seems a bit extreme like they’re trying to save face or risk being labeled that themselves?
Again, he apologized. They should reaffirm that he’s a good guy that normally doesn’t say these things, let the NBA punish him, then everyone moves on with their lives.
The problem is extreme reactions happen. Too many hyperactive people with short attention spans combine to overreact to these types of things.
When someone hurts your feelings then apologizes it’s much more productive and civil to simply accept their apology, ask that they make amends, then move on with your lives.
No point in trying to teach people lessons all the time. They already feel bad if their apology is sincere. Cut people some slack to make mistakes and learn. They’ll do the same for you. It’ll be a much happier and friendly society.
Selective outage.