JJ Redick addresses Doc Rivers rant Photo credit: The Old Man and the Three
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After enduring the wrath of the internet over his Doc Rivers rant on First Take, JJ Redick says he doesn’t regret what he said.

Making his first appearance on First Take in months Tuesday morning, Redick ripped Rivers for never taking any accountability after the Milwaukee Bucks head coach complained about the difficulty of taking over a team midseason. Rivers left ESPN for the Bucks and a $40 million contract last month.

On the latest episode of Redick’s The Old Man and the Three podcast, the former NBA player and current ESPN analyst addressed his viral rant on Rivers.


“Don’t regret what I said,” Redick explained after saying he rewatched the clip. “It’s truthful to me. I do regret the delivery. I think sometimes when you get in certain environments, you can get emotional and I regret that.”

“Sometimes, when things get clipped out, I know the Doc thing came across as personal, of course it was personal, because I played for him for four years,” Redick continued. “It got clipped out, it didn’t show the soundbites from earlier which hadn’t been addressed and I wanted to address them. That’s all.”


The soundbites that First Take aired seven minutes before Redick’s rant were not clipped, but they didn’t need to be. In the video, Redick made it clear he was reacting to something Rivers said and a good portion of the people watching the clip heard the head coach’s comments on taking the team over midseason because they similarly went viral.

Amid defending himself for the rant, Redick insisted he wasn’t attempting to play the victim, but wanted to call out a trend or criticism he had of the way people react to things that are said in the media.

“What I find interesting across the board in the discourse around things that are said through any media channel is that when someone says something that incites a reaction, very rarely do people actually address the substance of what was said,” Redick said. “Often times, they attack the individual or question the motivation or agenda behind what was said. If you noticed, on Tuesday, no one ever actually addressed the substance of what I said, they just came after me.”

Austin Rivers, Doc’s son, focused on the substance when he argued that his father is often held accountable for his team’s shortcomings. And Stephen A. Smith similarly addressed the substance by noting he believes this will be Rivers last coaching opportunity if things go continue to go south in Milwaukee, albeit before he alleged James Harden may have been behind Redick’s rant.

But Redick didn’t just call out an NBA coach. He called out his former coach and his former ESPN colleague and admitted it was personal. That has substance. It’s hard to expect everyone to just gloss over that substance to focus only on the analysis Redick was attempting to give.

[The Old Man and the Three]

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

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