Chris Broussard's "sources" say Isaiah Thomas wasn't liked by teammates in Boston.

FS1 “NBA Insider” Chris Broussard has taken a regular beating around these parts for his questionable sourcing, and he appears to be at it again. On Undisputed Wednesday, Broussard said Cleveland won the trade of Kyrie Irving for Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic and Brooklyn’s 2018 first-round pick, which isn’t an unreasonable take. However, he also decided to drop a bunch of criticisms of Thomas, saying that that plenty of NBA executives texted him to say that players in Boston didn’t like Thomas and that Thomas had a “Napoleon complex” (because he’s short, you know):

“I will tell you this. I spoke to several executives, or texted with several executives, last night. And a lot of them were saying that a lot of the players in Boston really weren’t that fond of Isaiah. We know he had those problems in Sacramento, and in Phoenix. I didn’t know he was having those issues, according to these executives, in Boston. He is known as a headstrong guy, he’s got a huge ego, they say he’s got the Napoleon complex, he always has that chip on his shoulder. So I’ll give you that.”

“But he knows the situation he’s stepping into, he knows that LeBron James is the best player in the world, and he knows the best way for himself to get paid after this season is for him to play well and help Cleveland get back to the Finals. And just like I told you when Durant went to Golden State, immediately, ‘They’re winning it all,’ I’m telling you, Cleveland is winning the East, and they’re better equipped to play Golden State than they were before.”

It’s amazing how Broussard can both praise and criticize Thomas in the same clip, and how he can just relay these comments with no filter. And what executives outside of Boston would have any clue how the other Celtics’ players felt about Thomas? Former Celtics’ forward Jared Sullinger took to Twitter to refute Broussard’s report (and NESN’s transcription of it), too, calling it “lies lies and More Lies!!!”:

Another former Celtics’ forward, Kelly Olynyk, called it preposterous:

Another funny thing here? NESN is getting all the traffic (and all the backlash, especially from those who see it as Boston media once more slamming a player on his way out of town) for their write-up of Broussard’s comments, which had over 165,000 views (according to their site) as of 6:00 p.m. Eastern. Wouldn’t it be nice if Fox still had a website they could write those comments up on? Instead, they laid off all their writers to pivot to video, and the outdated nature of their website (especially after their debate shows’ day ends) was on full display Tuesday night, as former Fox writer (and current The Athletic SF staffer) Dieter Kurtenbach noted:

Great job with that pivot, Fox. It makes it hard for you to even benefit from Broussard’s hot takes. (And it’s funny to note that the video on their site of this is headlined “Chris Broussard thinks Cleveland won the Kyrie Irving/Isaiah Thomas trade”; yes, he said that too, but that’s not the noteable part of this take, or the part that will make anyone click.) But hey, at least he and his sources are out there spreading info that Celtics’ players supposedly saw Thomas as a bad teammate.

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.