Like most sports figures, save a few, San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich doesn’t think a whole lot of Donald Trump. Sure, there are a few conservative coaches out there that support Trump, but by and large, famous people of any stripe tend to lean to the other side of the political aisle.

Popovich, however, has been one of Trump’s loudest detractors. If you thought basketball already had an anti-Trump voice in Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, just wait until you see what Popovich had to say on Saturday.

It started like any standard game presser, with questions about players and strategy and plans for the game. But then French journalist Théo Quintard asked Popovich about the importance of November’s presidential election, and the coach spoke his mind — for quite some time. I doubt reporters had it on their bingo cards for the night, unless they know they can always get some juicy quotes from Gregg if they just bring up Trump.

“He’s a pathetic individual. He’s a small man who has to make everybody around him smaller so he thinks he’s gonna be bigger,” he said to the gathered media. “And isn’t that the same thing we tell all of our kids in grade school? That’s not how you act. That’s not what you do.”

Indeed, that seems to be Popovich’s main gripe with Trump: He’s just plain mean.

But the coach has no love for Trump supporters, either, including those in government, like the Senator from Houston, Ted Cruz. Who knows if there’s a little beef there because the Rockets were the team Popovich’s Spurs were facing that night, but he called Cruz out by name, as well as Missouri’s Josh Hawley, both of whom are ardent Trump supporters.

But it’s not just Trump’s mean spirit that got to Coach Gregg. It’s the fact that he’s such a bad role model for anyone, but especially for kids.

“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. I mean, would you want your kids to act like he does?”

Then Popovich related it in the style of a sports analogy:

I gotta tell my grandkids that, I guess, that if they want to be like Trump, I gotta say, ‘Hey, today you’re gonna win. Cause 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 gotta figure out who to blame. You know, blame those referees because they were against you, blame your teammates because they didn’t play well, they should’ve maybe given you the ball more. But you don’t have to accept that.’

Just keep saying it. Just keep saying it. And you know, to the little kids, what’s really good about it? You keep saying it over and over, and all of a sudden, your life will be a little bit easier, because you’ll become delusional. Because you’ll actually believe some of the lies you’ve been telling yourself.

Popovich went on at some length about his confusion that college kids inexplicably like Trump — “Do they think he’s going to get them a job?” — and the many sycophants that Trump has in Congress, who have all said awful things about Trump in the past, then kissed the ring when Trump took power.

But in the last few minutes of Popovich’s commentary, he touches on what really matters, and that’s the legacy of destruction that Trump will leave behind.

“Now, the danger follows the delusion and our kids and grandkids are gonna have to live with what this guy puts out there,” he said. “I’m just hoping people who are already sold on him for whatever reason, I can’t figure it out… The ones that stay home and don’t vote are the ones that worry me because we need everybody to vote. I hope that they won’t stay home, that they’ll understand that this guy is a scam artist.”

And that really is the long and short of it. Donald Trump amounts to nothing more than a scam artist, a player in a game that even he doesn’t understand. Grifting is all Donald Trump has ever known, and it’s what he’ll go back to full time when he’s done stealing American citizens’ prescription money in exchange for his worthless trinkets and trading cards.

When all is said and done, Trump will go back to being a slumlord, just like he began his career. The only question is, will he lose another discrimination case to the Justice Department when he refuses to rent to anyone who didn’t vote for him?

I’d say Gregg Popovich’s assessment is a slam dunk. Watch it in its entirety (or until your neck starts to hurt from nodding so much) here:

🎥 Gregg Popovich spoke at length about the American elections between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Full answer 👇 pic.twitter.com/VYyKCaw8TT

— Théo Quintard (@TheoQuintard) October 26, 2024