Gregg Popovich commenting on Donald Trump. Gregg Popovich commenting on Donald Trump. (Awful Announcing on X.)

In the lead-up to the 2024 U.S. presidential election on Nov. 5, many figures in sports are weighing in. The latest is San Antonio Spurs’ head coach Gregg Popovich. Popovich has long been a critic of past president and current Republican nominee Donald Trump, including while Trump was in office from 2016-20, and he particularly unloaded on Trump in a press conference after the Spurs’ 109-106 win over the Houston Rockets Saturday. Here’s the key part of Popovich’s rant, plus the fuller 13-minute context of it (which came in response to a question from French journalist Théo Quintard of “Just one question about the U.S. election, what do you think about that, and is it important for the future of the democracy of the USA?”

Popovich answers that “important to democracy?” question with a “Probably,” getting a laugh from the assembled media, and then adds “Do you want me to speak for an hour?”, getting another laugh. He talks about how everyone has hundreds of thoughts on it, talks about trying to figure out why people vote for Trump, and says “This is the biggest whiner that ever walked the face of the earth. He’s like the poorest example of a fifth-grade bully I’ve ever seen.” (2:05).

Popovich then brings this to sports (3:00), saying that Trump’s repeated false claims he won the 2020 election would be a bad example for his grandchildren or anyone else in sports: “Am I going to say ‘Today, you’re going to win, because there’s no way you can lose, and if you do lose, it was rigged against you, so don’t buy it? Don’t buy it. You’ve got to figure out who to blame. Blame those referees, because they were against you. Blame your teammates, because they didn’t play well and they should have given you the ball more. But you don’t have to accept that. Just keep saying it, just keep saying it.”

At 4:30, Popovich calls Trump “a pathetic individual, a small, small man who has to make everyone around him smaller so he thinks he’s going to be bigger.” He then goes into a critique of Trump’s lack of detailed economic policy positions, saying “There’s nothing there but jibber-jabber,” and then gets to the key clip from above around 5:25:

“He’s pathetic. He’s small. He’s a whiner. We all know that. But you wouldn’t have him babysit your kids. You wouldn’t hire him—if you had a small business, you want that man in your business? There’s no way. But we’re going to vote for him for president? Because he’s strong? Kamala Harris whipped his a** in that debate, and he’s running ever since, he doesn’t want any part of her. Because, as she said before, she’s eaten many of his type for lunch as an attorney general, as a prosecutor. He’s a small fry compared to some of the people she’s gone after, and he knows it.

“So all he can do is cut people down and do what he does. We’ve all seen all that kind of stuff. The ones that you can be even more angry about, because he’s sick, he’s a damaged man. He grew up the biggest wannabe there ever was in New York, right? We all know that. He wanted to be in the inner circle. But they laughed at him his whole life.

“Just like Obama made fun of at that dinner, and he was about to melt. It angered him so bad, it was scary. But he was never accepted, he was treated like a fool, like a clown, and now he’s able to just give the finger to the world because of his position now. And that’s what he’s doing, he’s getting back at everybody, because he’s so small he’s got to go after everybody.”

Popovich’s criticisms of Trump go on from there, including citing all of the Trump critics who worked in his administration. But the 5:25-starting part of the clip is particularly notable for the language he uses. And while Popovich has long been a Trump critic (and has taken shots from Trump in return), it’s still remarkable to see him go on this particular extended run at a press conference.

[Awful Announcing on X]

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.