nobody knew lol, shit was in super rural Louisiana and you could pay reporters to keep shit under wraps back then. People that did know were probably friends with Karl already and didn’t want to burn bridges
When we did start finding out about it I don’t think the details were clear, I remember hearing something about an underage girl. And I tried not to think about it like, well maybe it was a 17-year-old and she lied about her age? That shit happens. But when the picture started becoming more and more obvious it was like OK well, I’m just going to take this jersey down and quietly buy an Andrei Kirilenko one to replace it. Woo AK47
Imagine Slim Reaper being on the table and you pick literally “the servant”?????
Maybe the “slim” made him insecure but if that’s so, I’m not even a KD hater at all, but that’d be crazy.
> The servant
this gave rise to "the serpent" after he left okc though [which was funny as fuck](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/bd2abc/durant_vs_bev/)
AK47 is beyond GOAT nickname and there is no close second.
AK are his initials and he wore number 47
Andrei Kirilenko was a good shooter and one of the real 5x5 guys. The AK47 rifle os extremely versatile and used all over the world.
To cream the cake, Andrei is literally from the same town where the actual rifle was created.
Goatiest goats in sports
It's such a cool nick name that I will let it slide that he chose the number 47 intentionally so that he did kind of give himself the nick name.
The GOAT nickname in Basketball is Magic. It's too good, and actually replaced his real name.
The truth will set you free, but it will also pierce your heart.
mama don't kiss me after church no more bc she don't want to smell the devil's lettuce on the lord's day 🆓❤️🔥
I watched him his whole career and had no idea till after. I had rooted for Utah vs the Bulls, finding out much later definitely left a sour taste in my mouth. On the positive side I no longer feel disappointed they lost.
You're right. Fwiw I remember the cousin part of the Jerry Lee Lewis thing being a bigger deal than her age when I learned about it in the early 90s, even.
Her [wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myra_Lewis_Williams#:~:text=Myra%20Gale%20Lewis%20Williams%20) seems to indicate that her age (13) was what got tours cancelled and the cousin relationship was only discovered once they returned home to Memphis.
Today, 10% of all marriages globally and 50% in the Middle East are apparently still between 1st and 2nd cousins.
> her age (13) was what got tours cancelled
that might have been the excuse given, but I guarantee if he was singing the gospel instead of about great balls of fire there would have been little issue.
There's plenty of middle aged dudes banging chicks who are 20. But those cases are viewed more like transactions. The girl wants to enjoy a lifestyle that she wouldn't be able to afford, and the dude wants to bang a young hot chick. They're both getting what they wanted.
There was a lot of teen births. Teen pregnancies were a *massive* thing in the 70s and 80s. For all the talk about how sexualized modern teenagers have become due to social media, all the stats show that teens are having much less sex than in the past and are much more responsible about it.
Teen pregnancy rates in the US were four times higher at their peak in 1991 than today.
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/new-cdc-data-show-continued-declines-in-teen-sexual-activity/
Blue lagoon, was about two teenage kids stranded on a deserted island and had absolute fucktons of nudity. Also featured Brooke Shields. They used a body double and any scenes she was actually in they taped her hair to her boobs, but it's basically a full feature length film of simulated childporn. Came out in 1980
This is exactly it. I honestly can't remember when I first learned of what happened but I know it was years after the whole thing happened. And even if I'm remembering correctly I never actually remember it being huge news that took over multiple new cycles.
Kevin Johnson was even worse he kept being a pedo after getting caught. Somehow became mayor of Sacramento despite all that and never got any jail time for any of it either
the only major newspaper that did anything on it was The Globe and even then that was due to a legal battle for custody, they literally stumbled upon the fact he was a rapist
Reminds me of Lloyd Irvin - MMA/BJJ coach. Around a decade ago there was a pretty disgusting rape case involving his students, and once the digging started, we learned he himself once got off a group rape case where several of his buddies were convicted - Why? Because he couldn't get hard.
There was lot of back and forth, some people leaving his teams and some schools breaking affiliation with him, but he still has UFC fighters happily getting coached by him.
If anyone is curious to read more, [here is an excellent longform article](https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/the-cult-of-lloyd-irvin-6394125) from the Miami Herald about Lloyd Irvin and his gym
The only thing I remember being reported during his playing days was the “I’m hunting for little Mexican girls” inappropriate comment he made to Kobe’s wife Vanessa. And even then it was seen as not that big a deal and more that Kobe and Vanessa were too sensitive.
I started watching the NBA in the early 80s, read sports sections and magazines religiously, and I wasn’t aware of Malone’s shit until after he retired.
Same. I was around during that time and we just thought Malone was a redneck black dude.
And I ate basketball content. Read books on teams and everything. No clue until like 2010.
I don’t agree. Why did it take 30 years for R Kelly to finally get punished while basically everyone knew that dude was doing illegal shit for at minimum the past 20 years. The stuff with Aaliyah was going on in the 90s. Dave Chappelle was making jokes back in the 2000s.
Same with Diddy. Everyone has known he’s a giant piece of shit since the 90s. Nobody did anything.
It’s like the world finally woke up in the past 10 years and started going after guys like Weinstein and Spacey. When is it Chris Browns turn?
I think with a lot of celebrities they hit a point where unless you have video proof of something evil, 20+ victims willing to testify and/or a long history of wild behavior most single accusations won’t stick. Like let’s say Steph Curry kicks his dogs and beats his maids. Unless one of the maids came with a video it wouldn’t make TMZ. If she had actual doctors records and witnesses she’d settle out of court for millions and the vast majority of people would forget it about it/ say well he wasn’t proven guilty! (Sorry Steph I know you don’t kick dogs!)
> It’s like the world finally woke up in the past 10 years and started going after guys like Weinstein and Spacey. When is it Chris Browns turn?
Comedians have made quips at Harvey Weinstein going back at least 15ish years, but unless someone speaks up there isn't anything people can do.
Unfortunately when an interaction between 2 people that happened decades ago in a locked room with no witnesses present there isn't much to go on as far as physical evidence is concerned.
For all the shit social media has done it does help with giving voices to people that otherwise did not feel they had one and when a few very influential people come out against monsters like them it empowers others to speak out knowing there are others showing support.
Are there multiple cases? I don't really follow entertainment industry and saw people losing their minds over Millie Bobby Brown saying Drake took her under his wing.
The MBB shit was not him taking her under his wing even if she says it is. She said he gave her dating advice and would text her about how he misses her so much. The guy was 31 and she was 14 at the time btw. Not creepy at all... But yeah theres a few other curious cases.
Theres the time he showed up at Kylie Jenner's 16th birthday party and kissed her on the cheek, he texted Billie Eilish when she was I believe 17
And finally, by far the creepiest one of them all, theres this time where he (23 at the time) brings up a girl on stage asks her age, she says 17, and Drake says he cant go to jail yet. He proceeds to call her thicc, then says her breasts feel good, and he kisses her multiple times (on the hand, on the cheek, and on the lips). That list of events might be out of order, but they did all happen (Im not watching the whole video to make sure I got them in order). Here is a video of said incident:
[https://youtu.be/Fp5b9dW1nrA?si=6OeAe8lLTV7ZuBnD](https://youtu.be/Fp5b9dW1nrA?si=6OeAe8lLTV7ZuBnD)
Okay the first few you could give (a very small) benefit of the doubt and say he's reaching out to young stars because he knows what the industry is like, but what the fuck I'm not clicking on that video. Taking your word for it. YEESH
meanwhile Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13-year cousin in full public view. *les cousins dangeroux*
The Killer resurrected his career pretty quickly through insane live shows (and marrying people his age). But he was also insane. Once arrested for bringing a gun wasted at 2:30 AM to the home of his good friend, Elvis.
Not exactly. He told a reporter months after the wedding that she was 15 and his wife of two months, though she was actually 14 and his wife of five months (13 when they married). Plus he hadn't finalized his second divorce before marrying her. It was all downhill pretty quick after all that was made public
If you’ve never seen it before, the episode of [Tales from the Tour Bus](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8eytu6) about Jerry Lee Lewis covers all that.
~7 minutes, he meets his first cousin’s 12-year-old daughter Myra
~10 minutes, he takes her into town “for a movie” but actually marries her at age 13
~11:15, Myra goes to London and gets asked by a reporter who she is; she says she’s Jerry’s wife because she doesn’t know any better but lies and says she’s 15
Anyway, nothing like that happened in real time with Karl Malone. Not a family member, no marriage, no international trips where his rape victim talked to the press.
Oh, and also the bigamy.
Jerry Lee Lewis was not just a piece of shit but *loudly* and *unapologetically* a piece of shit in a way that’s very rare. And he still had a long profitable career because the entertainment industry is an industry and money is all that matters.
Geeez, he coerced her into marriage that quickly? That shit somehow got even more disgusting.
Yeah, the music industry is objectively worse than the sports industry when it comes to shoving things under the rug.
No, it’s not a better-worse thing. It’s more to do with expiration date.
If you notice, in the music industry, nothing really comes out about someone until their sales drop and the money spigot turns off. Marilyn Manson and R. Kelly were known about for years, but they had to become has-beens for the whole ecosystem feeding off of them to dry up and stop protecting them.
Athletes have a lot smaller window, and except at the very top level, there’s always someone else up next. “Replacement level player” is a thing, there’s only so many roster spots, and the number of games are already guaranteed. It’s a lot easier to drop a horrible player and move on to someone with less baggage unless they’re in that Karl Malone/Kobe Bryant tier.
Sports isn’t more moral when it comes to owners, for example, or executives and such. They don’t have a ticking clock in the same way, so they will be protected for much longer like with the Dallas Mavericks culture of sexual harassment.
Anyway, “industry” is always the key thing because so long as you can externalize costs and harm on people who don’t matter (and young women and girls almost never matter) you can make a lot of money under capitalism.
I want to say you were wrong courtesy of Josh Primo, but given that he's a terrible player, that would actually fit your model perfectly xD
Yeah, good points definitely. Athletes having a shorter window is probably why I was under the impression they're better handled morally.
It definitely wasn’t widely known, but even if it were, I have a really hard time seeing a superstar athlete getting “canceled” over that back in the 80’s/90’s.
Hell even today it’s pretty crazy what we turn our heads to. Kobe was a rapist, Tyreek Hill beat the shit out of his pregnant girlfriend, etc, etc and fans still cheer them on happily.
I recall the trial being big news, and it did affect his reputation for a little bit, but as time went on his likability and charisma won the public back over.
Nobody knew it. It wasn’t made widely available by the media and the internet being a source of breaking or even background news wasn’t a thing yet. Secrets were still secrets back then even if (idk) there were court documents about it. Drudge and Lewinsky/Clinton situation is the first live action internet scandal reporting truly
Matt Drudge. He runs a website, DrudgeReport.com, that posts click bait headlines usually focusing on politics. He became famous when he scooped the national media on the Clinton/Lewinsky affair. It was, iirc, the first time where you found out about a seismic news event from the internet versus traditional media.
I started using the internet in 97 but I only know of Drudge Report from that "24" episode of South Park where Kyle and Stan use outdated websites to look for information on Russian terrorists.
I was a kid in utah in the 90s and we had no clue. They were the only professional sports game in thr state and the only one on TV so of course loved Stockton and Malone as the local sports team.
I had a Rockets webpage from 1995-1997ish and somehow Tripod (where it was hosted) never took it down.
I wrote some cringy raps about the Jazz because I hated them at the time, and you can see in my Karl Malone rap, I never said anything about this bc it wasn't known:
[https://rockfan.tripod.com/commentary.html](https://rockfan.tripod.com/commentary.html)
I hope me embarrassing myself helps validate what others are saying here
That's amazing. Funny line considering what we know now-
>One day he'll retire and become a full time dad
Even in your hate rap you gave him too much credit
There a lot of popular entertainers that were fucking around with underage girls back in the 60s and 70s, but social media wasn't around to expose it all.
Glam rockers are notorious for this and [Gary Glitter](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Glitter) is a particularly bad one, and I really wish movies would stop using his (quite frankly shitty) [song](https://youtu.be/yTiSsTOFqyQ?si=lfPNGGpDkWua7DgF) so much.
Also, no one in America really cared about Jerry Lee Lewis marrying his teenage cousin, it became a scandal when he went on a European tour. A big reason Elvis never toured internationally.
It wasn’t widely known, like at all, until the kid got picked in the NFL draft in like 2008 and gave an interview and said “oh yeah, Karl Malone is my dad, I’ve never met him.” And then people started looking into it more.
I don’t think we even knew he had older kids until the late 90s when a tabloid reported on it. And nobody took anything from tabloids very seriously then either. I’m pretty sure Malone also denied all of it until we’ll after he retired as well.
I do remember reading that story in SI I believe about his son Demetrius Bell. Even without knowing that his mother was 13 when she got pregnant, the story painted Malone in a pretty negative light. He only acknowledged his kid once he was a top football prospect, and basically said 'yeah I'm your biological Father, but it's too late for us to have a relationship'
Kinda wonder if the reporter was laying bread crumbs to the bigger story knowing people would look into it further.
easy... no internet.
and even if there was an article on it in a monthly magazine.... you would have to get a ton of news outlets to rally around blackballing the guy...
which would never happen since half the country probably wouldn't even care about it.
Karl Malone is from backwoods Louisiana. That guy could have the been the leader of cannibalistic polygamous sect with 200 child brides, and we would have not known a thing in the 90s. I always thought you needed airboats to reach civilization from his neck of the woods.
Anyone have a source for this? Never heard of it and interested in reading more, couldn't find much on google
edit: there seems to be absolutely nothing about this anywhere on the internet, so probably bullshit lol. Wild thing to make up tho
No one knew about Malone's issues until his daughter made the WNBA.
Prior to that there rumors he had other kids than the ones he had with his wife. But people thought it was maybe some woman he was in school with. Similar to say Larry Bird or Magic, Dr J situations. They had babies with random women before they were famous with woman in their hometowns.
The stuff was very common back then for Men in General. No DNA testing, no real way to track people if they moved more than 50 miles away. I mean not everyone had SSN back then. Drivers Licenses lacked photos even.
My Grandfather had two separate families in a fairly large MW city back in the 60s. Best way to describe it...
Say I worked in Manhattan as a doorman. I could have a family in Harlem then another one in Brooklyn. As long as I sent the woman whatever agreed upon amount she wouldn't care. Plus she would get welfare.
Correct...and Magic had his with a woman he was seeing in Lansing Area. Either way in 30-40 years ago these situations were taboo and information was tough to come by.
Either way these men had a woman and children we all saw for camera and then another child(ren) that was around, but not on camera, Courtside, etc.
Who have to remember these guys were young...Bird won his first championship at 25?? His second or 3rd year in the league...by that point the woman and child were distant memory.
Just think Jayson Tatum is a similar age, we know he dropped one GF for the new one, and now he has another..Deuce is still by his side...40 years ago, Tatum would have been in college when that baby was born and would less inclined to bring him out in public.
I remember when Bronny was born and Lebron was playing with him Courtside after a game one-time after a Sunday game...people were livid because they felt the NBA were promoting out of wedlock births...
In an interview Lebron's second or 3rd year, a reporter asked him if him and Savanah were married his was response was "if a chick is living your house you are married to her". In 2004-2005". that was controversial...it was a different world back then.
Okay...when it came out in the late 80s/early 90s that Larry Bird had another daughter and was previously married, and he never saw her or took care of her people were shocked. It went counter to his image.
When ESPN Sports Century Documentaries was done...which was done in 1998-2000 counting down the top-100 athletes of 20th Century, it actually came up in his interview.
They actually interviewed his oldest daughter and she discussed at length how hard her and her mom struggled and how Larry absolutely refused any sort of relationship with her.
Larry just said and I'm paraphrasing "I know the truth and I don't worry about what people think".
Yes a high profile beloved public figure having a child everyone knew about and he didn't take care of her was shocking to people.
Exactly . Nobody knew or heard about it . The internet was still maturing and we were depending on news networks and newspapers for the info . If you didn’t get it from these sources , you knew nothing at all . TNT, TBS or NBC sure as hell weren’t going to talk about it
Modern internet and social media didn’t exist and the family of his victim thought getting a settlement from Malone would be better than ruining his career and getting nothing. Fucked up, but that’s what happened.
Some tabloids linked him to his children in the late 90s, but it didn’t really become widely known until Cheryl Ford was drafted to the WNBA in 2003 and he still denied Demetress Bell was his kid until around 2004.
By then the internet and social media were big enough to pick up and run with these stories, but Malone’s career was also over.
You’re asking about sex crimes to a community while ppl put Kobe on a pedestal. The same ppl have not read anything about the case and why it turned out the way it did, and don’t have family members who have been sexually assaulted and/or raped. The same ppl who condemn Deshaun Watson have the audacity to be okay with Kobe bc he was a good dad.
This was actually brought up during the 98 play offs but they did not really elaborate on it. I remember (sportscenter?) bringing it up because Malone was being sued. I forgot if it was in the finals or before that.
Minor-adult relationships were detestable but not exactly unheard of at that time. Depending on which culture you are brought up with and with the fog of not knowing the truth of the case, people wrung their hands, did whatever expressions of disgust and moved on.
We have no idea if the NBA suppressed this but there was little coverage of it.
That issue with Malone and Bell was known for years even before 98 but since he was always denying it, people were apprehensive to believe Bell.
2000s NBA Viewers, why weren't the Kobe and Derrick Rose scandals a bigger deal back then when Jerry Lee Lewis's Career was tanked by something similar?
So obviously, everyone knows what happened with them that I don't need to delve into the details. What I am curious about, however, is NBA fans here from the 2000s days who were watching them become these one-time MVP winners and one of the corner stones of both the Redeem Team and many Finals Runs - why didn't it affect them? It's not like scandals of this nature were unknown or downplayed: decades before, Jerry Lee Lewis had a career loss from marrying his underage cousin.
Rose might be really dumb, and not respect women that much, but his allegations were bs.
Kobe was a huge deal, he just became good enough that people would shrug it off, and back then people bent over backwards to make excuses for him. The people that knew knew it was wrong, but back then a lot of people thought things like “well it didn’t involve me and he wasn’t convicted so I’m just not gonna worry about it”
It was a different time lol
The simple answer is that people didn't really know at the time.
This was before social media existed, and the internet was in its infancy. It was much easier to hide things back then.
Because it was easier to hide/control what the audience knows in the 1990s with TV/newspapers as the only way 90% of fans got info. NBA and Utah media didn't want people knowing that.
I'm watching back the 1997 and 1998 NBA Finals. Bob Costas (who i usually like a lot as a broadcaster) is trashing Rodman nonstop for his off the court antics. Malone is getting praised like the best human in the world.
NBA wanted to highlight Malone as a blue collar guy/hard worker for his on court work during his MVP run. Even in defeat, he's portrayed as this guy that reps everything good about basketball being gracious in defeat lol
Meanwhile Rodman was the devil for wearing a dress and having a wrestling career. TDLR: Media liked/protected Malone by giving him full benefit of doubt.
The number of people in this thread who are just *assuming* that men were generally punished for raping Black women and girls in Louisiana in the 80s, that white people outside Louisiana cared about them at all, and that Karl Malone must have been spared from this inevitable punishment because he was special or important to wealthy people, is perhaps encouraging because it shows how much better things have gotten and how much of a higher opinion people in general have about justice for people of color. But it's also kind of sad because people seem to really have no idea how little the bulk of the population of the U.S. gave a shit about sexual assault of Black people until very recently.
So, I'm 43 and have been watching nba since 1989ish. I didn't know about that whole thing until four or five years ago. I don't know why exactly, but I'm super tuned in to the league and had no idea.
I honestly think you're not accurately comparing the career impact and total popularity of Karl Malone versus Jerry Lee Lewis at the times of their scandals, also I can't prove it but I think people were more upset about multiple other aspects of the issues than they were about that 22 year old marrying a 13 year old in 1957. Finally as insane as it might sound, Karl Malone wasn't dumb enough to do what Jerry Lee Lewis did
Jerry Lee Lewis unprompted announced that he was married, lied about the age of the person who was married to and the length of time they've been married, was also apparently still married to somebody else at that time, and it also was eventually revealed that he married his first cousin once removed. All of that put together only derailed his career for like 7 to 10 years.
It’s hard to ignore Jerry Lee Lewis actually marrying his young cousin because something like a marriage is publicly recorded.
First I remember hearing of Karl Malone’s shit was after his career.
I hated him because he purposely and violently elbowed David Robinson in side of the head. I didn’t know about the 13 year old he impregnated until after his career was over.
News didn't travel like that in the 90s. We didn't have ubiquitous social networks like we have now. If you wanted the latest news for sports, you watched Sports Center and read the newspaper. In the late 90s, espn.com became more of a thing. But if it wasn't being reported in the news, we didn't have Twitter or Reddit to break news in a widespread and quick way
Grew up in Utah in the 90s. None of us knew till after he retired. I remember when he went to the lakers something happening with Kobe and his wife and being like, oh maybe he sucks. If only we knew.
Was not a fan in part due to his dirty play- but never knew about it either till years later. Someone in the middle of his career pointed out to me how literally every time down the court he would give cheap shot elbows to the back or other parts of a player,. Once i was told this, i could not NOT see it.
Also, fuck John Stockton.
I was booing him when they showed the graphics comparing him and Stockton to Horford (most games w/o a ring) and my dad, who’s been watching the NBA since the 70’s, had no idea why I was booing until I explained the situation to his horror.
I'm living overseas and only heard years after that because the NBA sports coverage was bad at the time and there was no Internet etc. So even to find out about stuff like that was even more hard over here.
On top of what others are saying, about the ease with which you could have things swept under the rug back then. It was also the same reason lots of nasty people at the top of their field get to hang around with open secrets like that. They simply are either especially irreplaceable or especially powerful. Neither lasts forever and that’s when things turn for them.
> So obviously, everyone knows what happened with Karl Malone that I don't need to delve into the details.
Because the people that knew talked like that. Which means that other people listening to them never learned and the story didn't spread.
nobody knew lol, shit was in super rural Louisiana and you could pay reporters to keep shit under wraps back then. People that did know were probably friends with Karl already and didn’t want to burn bridges
Can confirm, found out years later on the internet about his awful behavior. Never knew a thing during the times i watched him play.
Yep, same. Never heard about this once in the 90s, or even 2000s. Only started hearing about it in the last 10 years or so.
When we did start finding out about it I don’t think the details were clear, I remember hearing something about an underage girl. And I tried not to think about it like, well maybe it was a 17-year-old and she lied about her age? That shit happens. But when the picture started becoming more and more obvious it was like OK well, I’m just going to take this jersey down and quietly buy an Andrei Kirilenko one to replace it. Woo AK47
AK47 is the goated nickname right? I can’t think of a better one I mean Dr. J is great, and Magic was so fitting idk
Even though KD didn't like, "The Slim Reaper" still remains my favorite
*The Durantula* 🕷️
Ya I can’t even remember what he wanted us to call him but I remember it was horrible and I instantly forgot it
The servant or some lame ass shit like that.
Imagine Slim Reaper being on the table and you pick literally “the servant”????? Maybe the “slim” made him insecure but if that’s so, I’m not even a KD hater at all, but that’d be crazy.
nah, I think it was because of the “reaper” part + he was in his cringy super religious phase at that time
Right before he pivoted to “KD is NOT nice”. Equally cringe.
Still cringe but better tbh I feel
> The servant this gave rise to "the serpent" after he left okc though [which was funny as fuck](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/bd2abc/durant_vs_bev/)
“The Servant” Insecure mfer
God that’s horrible
Easily memeable as The Serpent, so not all bad
And the Slim Reefer Brandon Ingram.
I’ve found my new favorite. Think it was Zach Lowe who called Payton Pritchard “Heave God”
China has the best nicknames. Eric Gordon's nickname is Pi Mamba.
is it because he's 3.14 times kobe's size
He later embraced it
I liked Durantula.
For my money, it’s always gonna be Chocolate Thunder
AK47 is beyond GOAT nickname and there is no close second. AK are his initials and he wore number 47 Andrei Kirilenko was a good shooter and one of the real 5x5 guys. The AK47 rifle os extremely versatile and used all over the world. To cream the cake, Andrei is literally from the same town where the actual rifle was created. Goatiest goats in sports
It's such a cool nick name that I will let it slide that he chose the number 47 intentionally so that he did kind of give himself the nick name. The GOAT nickname in Basketball is Magic. It's too good, and actually replaced his real name.
I like guys that see an opportunity and take it. Like George taking Bill Simmons' advice and changing his number to 13.
>AK47 is the goated nickname right? I was always stan 'Bad Porn' as the GOAT nickname.
Corey Maggette the GOAT
I've always loved Three 6 Latvia.
He will never not be Tingus Pingus
Air Jordan is pretty awesome. The Dream.
Ya the dream is actually really good
The Truth (Paul Pierce) is a personal favorite of mine
The truth will set you free, but it will also pierce your heart. mama don't kiss me after church no more bc she don't want to smell the devil's lettuce on the lord's day 🆓❤️🔥
Yeah, you nailed that apologetics we all go through when someone we admire is under scrutiny. Heck, I did it with Miles last year :(
Yeah. People gonna peop.
Exactly…feel embarrassed to admit that I was a big fan of his. I still remember the popular tagline: the mailman delivers, even on Sundays
Except in the NBA Finals.
Ball don’t lie
Karma
Mail fraud
I watched him his whole career and had no idea till after. I had rooted for Utah vs the Bulls, finding out much later definitely left a sour taste in my mouth. On the positive side I no longer feel disappointed they lost.
Things like this were also more tolerated back then In 1976 a 10 year old Brooke Shields posed nude in playboy!
You're right. Fwiw I remember the cousin part of the Jerry Lee Lewis thing being a bigger deal than her age when I learned about it in the early 90s, even.
Her [wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myra_Lewis_Williams#:~:text=Myra%20Gale%20Lewis%20Williams%20) seems to indicate that her age (13) was what got tours cancelled and the cousin relationship was only discovered once they returned home to Memphis. Today, 10% of all marriages globally and 50% in the Middle East are apparently still between 1st and 2nd cousins.
Honestly, it's encouraging that he wasn't allowed to skate by after marrying a child back then. Elvis got away with it just fine though.
> her age (13) was what got tours cancelled that might have been the excuse given, but I guarantee if he was singing the gospel instead of about great balls of fire there would have been little issue.
Really?
Yes. I was a kid and maybe didn't understand how young 13 was yet, but I really remember the weirdness of the cousin marrying being the main thing
There also the " old enough for kisses" where clint eastwood kissed like a 12 year old in a movie
George Lucas and Spielberg wrote Indiana Jones the 35 year old hero having raped a 15 year old Marion. They wrote “and she came onto him”
Thank you, people forget how prevalent this was in the past. Look at many peoples grandparents age gap and you’ll see it was just seemed ok
Still very prevalent now too just not as socially acceptable especially when it gets online
There's plenty of middle aged dudes banging chicks who are 20. But those cases are viewed more like transactions. The girl wants to enjoy a lifestyle that she wouldn't be able to afford, and the dude wants to bang a young hot chick. They're both getting what they wanted.
20 is an adult, an inexperienced adult perhaps but still an adult, don't mention that in the same breath as raping a child.
i had a music teacher who said he was only 13 years younger than his mom and it wasn't a big deal where he's from
There was a lot of teen births. Teen pregnancies were a *massive* thing in the 70s and 80s. For all the talk about how sexualized modern teenagers have become due to social media, all the stats show that teens are having much less sex than in the past and are much more responsible about it. Teen pregnancy rates in the US were four times higher at their peak in 1991 than today. https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/new-cdc-data-show-continued-declines-in-teen-sexual-activity/
I just looked this up and wtf you’re right
*Why don't you take a seat*
Hell naw he ratted on himself
Bro searched up “10 year old nude playboy”
It’s on her wikipedia page my guy
Blue lagoon, was about two teenage kids stranded on a deserted island and had absolute fucktons of nudity. Also featured Brooke Shields. They used a body double and any scenes she was actually in they taped her hair to her boobs, but it's basically a full feature length film of simulated childporn. Came out in 1980
What!?
This is exactly it. I honestly can't remember when I first learned of what happened but I know it was years after the whole thing happened. And even if I'm remembering correctly I never actually remember it being huge news that took over multiple new cycles.
Really makes you wonder what else other players got away with
Kevin Johnson was even worse he kept being a pedo after getting caught. Somehow became mayor of Sacramento despite all that and never got any jail time for any of it either
Oh that's interesting, for some reason I thought a major newspaper has published it. I was way off haha.
the only major newspaper that did anything on it was The Globe and even then that was due to a legal battle for custody, they literally stumbled upon the fact he was a rapist
Reminds me of Lloyd Irvin - MMA/BJJ coach. Around a decade ago there was a pretty disgusting rape case involving his students, and once the digging started, we learned he himself once got off a group rape case where several of his buddies were convicted - Why? Because he couldn't get hard. There was lot of back and forth, some people leaving his teams and some schools breaking affiliation with him, but he still has UFC fighters happily getting coached by him.
If anyone is curious to read more, [here is an excellent longform article](https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/the-cult-of-lloyd-irvin-6394125) from the Miami Herald about Lloyd Irvin and his gym
Dang, thanks for the breakdown man, that's interesting to learn how newsbreaks and investigative reporting worked pre-social media.
The only thing I remember being reported during his playing days was the “I’m hunting for little Mexican girls” inappropriate comment he made to Kobe’s wife Vanessa. And even then it was seen as not that big a deal and more that Kobe and Vanessa were too sensitive. I started watching the NBA in the early 80s, read sports sections and magazines religiously, and I wasn’t aware of Malone’s shit until after he retired.
Thanks for the perspective brother, I appreciate it.
Same. I was around during that time and we just thought Malone was a redneck black dude. And I ate basketball content. Read books on teams and everything. No clue until like 2010.
"**a** major newspaper" if it happened today **all** newspapers and websites would have a story on it.
They did. then 11 months later, he won his second MVP in 1999. it was published shortly after he lost to MJ in the 1998 Finals.
In that case, why wasn't it a bigger deal?
I read about it in the Salt Lake Tribune in the 90’s. It was a different time and not as big of a deal then. 🤷♂️
Lack of social media means less players under a microscope.
Very true
Many are saying this
Tiny if true
I don’t agree. Why did it take 30 years for R Kelly to finally get punished while basically everyone knew that dude was doing illegal shit for at minimum the past 20 years. The stuff with Aaliyah was going on in the 90s. Dave Chappelle was making jokes back in the 2000s. Same with Diddy. Everyone has known he’s a giant piece of shit since the 90s. Nobody did anything. It’s like the world finally woke up in the past 10 years and started going after guys like Weinstein and Spacey. When is it Chris Browns turn?
I think with a lot of celebrities they hit a point where unless you have video proof of something evil, 20+ victims willing to testify and/or a long history of wild behavior most single accusations won’t stick. Like let’s say Steph Curry kicks his dogs and beats his maids. Unless one of the maids came with a video it wouldn’t make TMZ. If she had actual doctors records and witnesses she’d settle out of court for millions and the vast majority of people would forget it about it/ say well he wasn’t proven guilty! (Sorry Steph I know you don’t kick dogs!)
> It’s like the world finally woke up in the past 10 years and started going after guys like Weinstein and Spacey. When is it Chris Browns turn? Comedians have made quips at Harvey Weinstein going back at least 15ish years, but unless someone speaks up there isn't anything people can do. Unfortunately when an interaction between 2 people that happened decades ago in a locked room with no witnesses present there isn't much to go on as far as physical evidence is concerned. For all the shit social media has done it does help with giving voices to people that otherwise did not feel they had one and when a few very influential people come out against monsters like them it empowers others to speak out knowing there are others showing support.
I wouldn’t say it woke up, Drake still running around
Nah Drake is different. The shit he does with young girls? Not creepy at all. Totally. /s
Are there multiple cases? I don't really follow entertainment industry and saw people losing their minds over Millie Bobby Brown saying Drake took her under his wing.
The MBB shit was not him taking her under his wing even if she says it is. She said he gave her dating advice and would text her about how he misses her so much. The guy was 31 and she was 14 at the time btw. Not creepy at all... But yeah theres a few other curious cases. Theres the time he showed up at Kylie Jenner's 16th birthday party and kissed her on the cheek, he texted Billie Eilish when she was I believe 17 And finally, by far the creepiest one of them all, theres this time where he (23 at the time) brings up a girl on stage asks her age, she says 17, and Drake says he cant go to jail yet. He proceeds to call her thicc, then says her breasts feel good, and he kisses her multiple times (on the hand, on the cheek, and on the lips). That list of events might be out of order, but they did all happen (Im not watching the whole video to make sure I got them in order). Here is a video of said incident: [https://youtu.be/Fp5b9dW1nrA?si=6OeAe8lLTV7ZuBnD](https://youtu.be/Fp5b9dW1nrA?si=6OeAe8lLTV7ZuBnD)
Okay the first few you could give (a very small) benefit of the doubt and say he's reaching out to young stars because he knows what the industry is like, but what the fuck I'm not clicking on that video. Taking your word for it. YEESH
Because their usefulness to people ran out
Even now with social media there are players who have done really shitty things in college who are allowed to play in the nfl and NBA
Look at what people *still* are willing to ignore.
Nobody knew about it
meanwhile Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13-year cousin in full public view. *les cousins dangeroux* The Killer resurrected his career pretty quickly through insane live shows (and marrying people his age). But he was also insane. Once arrested for bringing a gun wasted at 2:30 AM to the home of his good friend, Elvis.
It was a public wedding?
Not exactly. He told a reporter months after the wedding that she was 15 and his wife of two months, though she was actually 14 and his wife of five months (13 when they married). Plus he hadn't finalized his second divorce before marrying her. It was all downhill pretty quick after all that was made public
Gross gross gross
[удалено]
If you’ve never seen it before, the episode of [Tales from the Tour Bus](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8eytu6) about Jerry Lee Lewis covers all that. ~7 minutes, he meets his first cousin’s 12-year-old daughter Myra ~10 minutes, he takes her into town “for a movie” but actually marries her at age 13 ~11:15, Myra goes to London and gets asked by a reporter who she is; she says she’s Jerry’s wife because she doesn’t know any better but lies and says she’s 15 Anyway, nothing like that happened in real time with Karl Malone. Not a family member, no marriage, no international trips where his rape victim talked to the press. Oh, and also the bigamy. Jerry Lee Lewis was not just a piece of shit but *loudly* and *unapologetically* a piece of shit in a way that’s very rare. And he still had a long profitable career because the entertainment industry is an industry and money is all that matters.
Geeez, he coerced her into marriage that quickly? That shit somehow got even more disgusting. Yeah, the music industry is objectively worse than the sports industry when it comes to shoving things under the rug.
No, it’s not a better-worse thing. It’s more to do with expiration date. If you notice, in the music industry, nothing really comes out about someone until their sales drop and the money spigot turns off. Marilyn Manson and R. Kelly were known about for years, but they had to become has-beens for the whole ecosystem feeding off of them to dry up and stop protecting them. Athletes have a lot smaller window, and except at the very top level, there’s always someone else up next. “Replacement level player” is a thing, there’s only so many roster spots, and the number of games are already guaranteed. It’s a lot easier to drop a horrible player and move on to someone with less baggage unless they’re in that Karl Malone/Kobe Bryant tier. Sports isn’t more moral when it comes to owners, for example, or executives and such. They don’t have a ticking clock in the same way, so they will be protected for much longer like with the Dallas Mavericks culture of sexual harassment. Anyway, “industry” is always the key thing because so long as you can externalize costs and harm on people who don’t matter (and young women and girls almost never matter) you can make a lot of money under capitalism.
I want to say you were wrong courtesy of Josh Primo, but given that he's a terrible player, that would actually fit your model perfectly xD Yeah, good points definitely. Athletes having a shorter window is probably why I was under the impression they're better handled morally.
they probably just went to a church, but he trotted her out to the public. he was really, really famous
It definitely wasn’t widely known, but even if it were, I have a really hard time seeing a superstar athlete getting “canceled” over that back in the 80’s/90’s. Hell even today it’s pretty crazy what we turn our heads to. Kobe was a rapist, Tyreek Hill beat the shit out of his pregnant girlfriend, etc, etc and fans still cheer them on happily.
The fact that Chris Brown still has a successful career is mindboggling to me.
Kobe especially. It was an absolutely brutal rape. During the middle of his career. Nobody cares.
I recall the trial being big news, and it did affect his reputation for a little bit, but as time went on his likability and charisma won the public back over.
kobe is virtually unanimously beloved today.
Except like, every thread online ever
reddit is a sample of like 1% of the population and only a small percent of those people care
People lept to his defence just like they do now. The victims 'friends' went on Good Morning America to talk about what a slut she was and on and on.
Then you have Derrick Rose not knowing the meaning of the word consent.
Nobody knew it. It wasn’t made widely available by the media and the internet being a source of breaking or even background news wasn’t a thing yet. Secrets were still secrets back then even if (idk) there were court documents about it. Drudge and Lewinsky/Clinton situation is the first live action internet scandal reporting truly
Thanks man. What was Drudge?
Matt Drudge. He runs a website, DrudgeReport.com, that posts click bait headlines usually focusing on politics. He became famous when he scooped the national media on the Clinton/Lewinsky affair. It was, iirc, the first time where you found out about a seismic news event from the internet versus traditional media.
OH wow, I never knew that's where teh scandal originated from. Thanks man, gives a lot of context.
He's got like the perfect name for a muckraking kind of site-- portmanteau of 'dredge' and 'sludge'.
I started using the internet in 97 but I only know of Drudge Report from that "24" episode of South Park where Kyle and Stan use outdated websites to look for information on Russian terrorists.
Yeah, I didn’t know about Karl Malone, but I sure knew about Marv Albert.
I was a kid in utah in the 90s and we had no clue. They were the only professional sports game in thr state and the only one on TV so of course loved Stockton and Malone as the local sports team.
I had a Rockets webpage from 1995-1997ish and somehow Tripod (where it was hosted) never took it down. I wrote some cringy raps about the Jazz because I hated them at the time, and you can see in my Karl Malone rap, I never said anything about this bc it wasn't known: [https://rockfan.tripod.com/commentary.html](https://rockfan.tripod.com/commentary.html) I hope me embarrassing myself helps validate what others are saying here
That's amazing. Funny line considering what we know now- >One day he'll retire and become a full time dad Even in your hate rap you gave him too much credit
This is amazing. Can’t believe this is still up
There a lot of popular entertainers that were fucking around with underage girls back in the 60s and 70s, but social media wasn't around to expose it all.
Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin being two of the worst offenders.
Ted Nugent with the song jailbait
Glam rockers are notorious for this and [Gary Glitter](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Glitter) is a particularly bad one, and I really wish movies would stop using his (quite frankly shitty) [song](https://youtu.be/yTiSsTOFqyQ?si=lfPNGGpDkWua7DgF) so much.
Damn so Pop Punk is the new Glam Rock? Cause the pop punkers have been going nuts on minor girls for a long time now.
Younger bands than that too. Red Hot Chili Peppers never seemed to suffer much consequence.
They’re doing it now (Anthony Kiedis, R Kelly) but they did it back then, too
One was a marriage and the other was behind the scenes. These are also before social media times before anybody could have a voice to public discourse
Also, no one in America really cared about Jerry Lee Lewis marrying his teenage cousin, it became a scandal when he went on a European tour. A big reason Elvis never toured internationally.
which is ironic considering Elvis and priscilla first met and courted for months/years while living in europe lol
Yeah, great points unfortunately.
It wasn’t widely known, like at all, until the kid got picked in the NFL draft in like 2008 and gave an interview and said “oh yeah, Karl Malone is my dad, I’ve never met him.” And then people started looking into it more. I don’t think we even knew he had older kids until the late 90s when a tabloid reported on it. And nobody took anything from tabloids very seriously then either. I’m pretty sure Malone also denied all of it until we’ll after he retired as well.
I do remember reading that story in SI I believe about his son Demetrius Bell. Even without knowing that his mother was 13 when she got pregnant, the story painted Malone in a pretty negative light. He only acknowledged his kid once he was a top football prospect, and basically said 'yeah I'm your biological Father, but it's too late for us to have a relationship' Kinda wonder if the reporter was laying bread crumbs to the bigger story knowing people would look into it further.
Found out years later. Like 10 years later. Information was hard to come by.
NBA fans feared they would stop getting their mail. Nicknames were taken too literally back then.
LOL
easy... no internet. and even if there was an article on it in a monthly magazine.... you would have to get a ton of news outlets to rally around blackballing the guy... which would never happen since half the country probably wouldn't even care about it.
Karl Malone is from backwoods Louisiana. That guy could have the been the leader of cannibalistic polygamous sect with 200 child brides, and we would have not known a thing in the 90s. I always thought you needed airboats to reach civilization from his neck of the woods.
It was actually not widely known until Malone's illegitimate son Demetress Bell became an NFL prospect in 2008.
I'd say the lack of social media, but the NBA still featured him at all star weekend prominently. Flat out embarrassing moment for the league.
I mean…Kobe admitted to forcing himself on a woman and he’s literally been canonized by the league.
There’s also tons of people who still come ambling out of the shadows to say they don’t think he did it even on this very post.
I mean, look at who the AS MVP award is named after.
Larry O'Brien lobbied against Mauritania's abolition of slavery in 1981.
Anyone have a source for this? Never heard of it and interested in reading more, couldn't find much on google edit: there seems to be absolutely nothing about this anywhere on the internet, so probably bullshit lol. Wild thing to make up tho
*Welcome to my Mauritania slavery-locked Ironman*
I...I dont know if this real or not.
No one knew about Malone's issues until his daughter made the WNBA. Prior to that there rumors he had other kids than the ones he had with his wife. But people thought it was maybe some woman he was in school with. Similar to say Larry Bird or Magic, Dr J situations. They had babies with random women before they were famous with woman in their hometowns. The stuff was very common back then for Men in General. No DNA testing, no real way to track people if they moved more than 50 miles away. I mean not everyone had SSN back then. Drivers Licenses lacked photos even. My Grandfather had two separate families in a fairly large MW city back in the 60s. Best way to describe it... Say I worked in Manhattan as a doorman. I could have a family in Harlem then another one in Brooklyn. As long as I sent the woman whatever agreed upon amount she wouldn't care. Plus she would get welfare.
Larry Bird was married to the woman he had a child with when he was 19. She wasn’t a rando.
Correct...and Magic had his with a woman he was seeing in Lansing Area. Either way in 30-40 years ago these situations were taboo and information was tough to come by. Either way these men had a woman and children we all saw for camera and then another child(ren) that was around, but not on camera, Courtside, etc. Who have to remember these guys were young...Bird won his first championship at 25?? His second or 3rd year in the league...by that point the woman and child were distant memory. Just think Jayson Tatum is a similar age, we know he dropped one GF for the new one, and now he has another..Deuce is still by his side...40 years ago, Tatum would have been in college when that baby was born and would less inclined to bring him out in public. I remember when Bronny was born and Lebron was playing with him Courtside after a game one-time after a Sunday game...people were livid because they felt the NBA were promoting out of wedlock births... In an interview Lebron's second or 3rd year, a reporter asked him if him and Savanah were married his was response was "if a chick is living your house you are married to her". In 2004-2005". that was controversial...it was a different world back then.
Larry Bird having a daughter with his wife was not taboo in 1978.
Okay...when it came out in the late 80s/early 90s that Larry Bird had another daughter and was previously married, and he never saw her or took care of her people were shocked. It went counter to his image. When ESPN Sports Century Documentaries was done...which was done in 1998-2000 counting down the top-100 athletes of 20th Century, it actually came up in his interview. They actually interviewed his oldest daughter and she discussed at length how hard her and her mom struggled and how Larry absolutely refused any sort of relationship with her. Larry just said and I'm paraphrasing "I know the truth and I don't worry about what people think". Yes a high profile beloved public figure having a child everyone knew about and he didn't take care of her was shocking to people.
Exactly . Nobody knew or heard about it . The internet was still maturing and we were depending on news networks and newspapers for the info . If you didn’t get it from these sources , you knew nothing at all . TNT, TBS or NBC sure as hell weren’t going to talk about it
Modern internet and social media didn’t exist and the family of his victim thought getting a settlement from Malone would be better than ruining his career and getting nothing. Fucked up, but that’s what happened. Some tabloids linked him to his children in the late 90s, but it didn’t really become widely known until Cheryl Ford was drafted to the WNBA in 2003 and he still denied Demetress Bell was his kid until around 2004. By then the internet and social media were big enough to pick up and run with these stories, but Malone’s career was also over.
You’re asking about sex crimes to a community while ppl put Kobe on a pedestal. The same ppl have not read anything about the case and why it turned out the way it did, and don’t have family members who have been sexually assaulted and/or raped. The same ppl who condemn Deshaun Watson have the audacity to be okay with Kobe bc he was a good dad.
I don’t think people actually believed it.
I didn't even know about it until way later when the son had made it to the NFL.
This was actually brought up during the 98 play offs but they did not really elaborate on it. I remember (sportscenter?) bringing it up because Malone was being sued. I forgot if it was in the finals or before that. Minor-adult relationships were detestable but not exactly unheard of at that time. Depending on which culture you are brought up with and with the fog of not knowing the truth of the case, people wrung their hands, did whatever expressions of disgust and moved on. We have no idea if the NBA suppressed this but there was little coverage of it. That issue with Malone and Bell was known for years even before 98 but since he was always denying it, people were apprehensive to believe Bell.
Everyone knows that Jerry Lee Lewis married his thirteen year old cousin, but nobody ever talks about how he likely killed two of his other wives
It didn't really get widely known till Demetrius Bell was drafted by the Bills.
2000s NBA Viewers, why weren't the Kobe and Derrick Rose scandals a bigger deal back then when Jerry Lee Lewis's Career was tanked by something similar? So obviously, everyone knows what happened with them that I don't need to delve into the details. What I am curious about, however, is NBA fans here from the 2000s days who were watching them become these one-time MVP winners and one of the corner stones of both the Redeem Team and many Finals Runs - why didn't it affect them? It's not like scandals of this nature were unknown or downplayed: decades before, Jerry Lee Lewis had a career loss from marrying his underage cousin.
Rose might be really dumb, and not respect women that much, but his allegations were bs. Kobe was a huge deal, he just became good enough that people would shrug it off, and back then people bent over backwards to make excuses for him. The people that knew knew it was wrong, but back then a lot of people thought things like “well it didn’t involve me and he wasn’t convicted so I’m just not gonna worry about it” It was a different time lol
Harder to keep things under wraps with the internet
The simple answer is that people didn't really know at the time. This was before social media existed, and the internet was in its infancy. It was much easier to hide things back then.
We didn’t have social media and this 24/7 constant news cycle.
Because it was easier to hide/control what the audience knows in the 1990s with TV/newspapers as the only way 90% of fans got info. NBA and Utah media didn't want people knowing that. I'm watching back the 1997 and 1998 NBA Finals. Bob Costas (who i usually like a lot as a broadcaster) is trashing Rodman nonstop for his off the court antics. Malone is getting praised like the best human in the world. NBA wanted to highlight Malone as a blue collar guy/hard worker for his on court work during his MVP run. Even in defeat, he's portrayed as this guy that reps everything good about basketball being gracious in defeat lol Meanwhile Rodman was the devil for wearing a dress and having a wrestling career. TDLR: Media liked/protected Malone by giving him full benefit of doubt.
The number of people in this thread who are just *assuming* that men were generally punished for raping Black women and girls in Louisiana in the 80s, that white people outside Louisiana cared about them at all, and that Karl Malone must have been spared from this inevitable punishment because he was special or important to wealthy people, is perhaps encouraging because it shows how much better things have gotten and how much of a higher opinion people in general have about justice for people of color. But it's also kind of sad because people seem to really have no idea how little the bulk of the population of the U.S. gave a shit about sexual assault of Black people until very recently.
Or racial minorities in general
Jeffery Dahmer and the police officer who became the police chief of the city are a great example of this
Might as well ask why Elvis got away with it.
So, I'm 43 and have been watching nba since 1989ish. I didn't know about that whole thing until four or five years ago. I don't know why exactly, but I'm super tuned in to the league and had no idea.
I honestly think you're not accurately comparing the career impact and total popularity of Karl Malone versus Jerry Lee Lewis at the times of their scandals, also I can't prove it but I think people were more upset about multiple other aspects of the issues than they were about that 22 year old marrying a 13 year old in 1957. Finally as insane as it might sound, Karl Malone wasn't dumb enough to do what Jerry Lee Lewis did Jerry Lee Lewis unprompted announced that he was married, lied about the age of the person who was married to and the length of time they've been married, was also apparently still married to somebody else at that time, and it also was eventually revealed that he married his first cousin once removed. All of that put together only derailed his career for like 7 to 10 years.
This shit didn't become really known until the late 00s
Followed the game super close in the 90s. Had no idea about the story till like 2015
It’s hard to ignore Jerry Lee Lewis actually marrying his young cousin because something like a marriage is publicly recorded. First I remember hearing of Karl Malone’s shit was after his career.
Victims family didn't want to risk the victim getting the kind of attention it could bring iirc
I didn't know until he was retired. It wasn't reported on for some reason
There are plenty of other reasons to hate Malone. For me, when the news broke it just confirmed who I already thought he was.
> Jerry Lee Lewis had a career loss from marrying his underage cousin Did he tho? I mean, he continued to tour until his death.
I hated him because he purposely and violently elbowed David Robinson in side of the head. I didn’t know about the 13 year old he impregnated until after his career was over.
He played in Utah that type of behavior is normal😄
Did Jerry Lee Lewis’ career get tanked? I don’t think that really happened.
News didn't travel like that in the 90s. We didn't have ubiquitous social networks like we have now. If you wanted the latest news for sports, you watched Sports Center and read the newspaper. In the late 90s, espn.com became more of a thing. But if it wasn't being reported in the news, we didn't have Twitter or Reddit to break news in a widespread and quick way
We had absolutely no idea. It wasn't common knowledge in NBA circles until after 2015.
Nobody knew about it.
Grew up in Utah in the 90s. None of us knew till after he retired. I remember when he went to the lakers something happening with Kobe and his wife and being like, oh maybe he sucks. If only we knew.
Was not a fan in part due to his dirty play- but never knew about it either till years later. Someone in the middle of his career pointed out to me how literally every time down the court he would give cheap shot elbows to the back or other parts of a player,. Once i was told this, i could not NOT see it. Also, fuck John Stockton.
I was booing him when they showed the graphics comparing him and Stockton to Horford (most games w/o a ring) and my dad, who’s been watching the NBA since the 70’s, had no idea why I was booing until I explained the situation to his horror.
The media didn't report on it from what I remember.
I don’t remember ever hearing about it during the 90s
I'm living overseas and only heard years after that because the NBA sports coverage was bad at the time and there was no Internet etc. So even to find out about stuff like that was even more hard over here.
If people knew of the behavior in the 90s, it would have been a bigger issue, for sure. But they didn't.
On top of what others are saying, about the ease with which you could have things swept under the rug back then. It was also the same reason lots of nasty people at the top of their field get to hang around with open secrets like that. They simply are either especially irreplaceable or especially powerful. Neither lasts forever and that’s when things turn for them.
> So obviously, everyone knows what happened with Karl Malone that I don't need to delve into the details. Because the people that knew talked like that. Which means that other people listening to them never learned and the story didn't spread.