The Problem With Jon Stewart - Jon Talks With Steve Kerr: The Nicest, Whitest Man in Basketball

Episode Date: December 2, 2021

Steve Kerr thinks he’s here to talk with Jon about his career, speaking out on social issues, and the racial and political dynamics of the NBA. And he does get to talk about those things, but not before enduring Jon’s pleas for him to coach the Knicks. Staff writers Jay and Henrik offer some color commentary as well. CREDITSHosted by: Jon StewartFeaturing, in order of appearance: Jay Jurden, Henrik Blix, Steve KerrExecutive Produced by: Jon Stewart, Brinda Adhikari, James Dixon, Chris McShane, and Richard PleplerLead Producer: Sophie EricksonProducers: Caity Gray, Robby SlowikAssoc. Producer: Andrea Betanzos, Zach Silberberg Sound Designer & Audio Engineer: Miguel CarrascalSenior Digital Producer: Kwame OpamDigital Coordinator: Norma HernandezSupervising Producer: Lorrie BaranekHead Writer: Chelsea DevantezElements Producer: Kenneth HullTalent: Brittany Mehmedovic, Haley DenzakResearch: Susan Helvenston, Andy Crystal, Anne Bennett, Deniz Çam, Harjyot Ron SinghTheme Music by: Gary Clark Jr.The Problem With Jon Stewart podcast is an Apple TV+ podcast produced by Busboy Productions. https://apple.co/-JonStewart 

Have you been working on your Steve Kerr impression? I think, no, Henrik has. No, okay. I did used to watch a Steve Kerr shooting instructional video on YouTube. Oh my God. To work on my jump shot. What's the one thing that you remember from that video? So there's a guys who their motion starts like at the top of their jump

and there's guys who like their whole body gets into it and he's a whole body guy. Whole body is old school. If you watch the old 40s and 50s, they never shot the shot from their knees. They would bring it up and roll it. And then it was years later where guys would be like, you know, I'm strong enough to hold the ball up by my head. It's because we got rid of polio. In the 60s, once we got calcium in our diets.

And that's why the vaccine should be mandatory. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the podcast. So we're here. We got Jay Jordan, Henrik Glicks. They are writers on the program. They are enormous basketball fans. Steve Kerr is the guest.

He is the Chicago Bulls sharpshooter. Many championships during the Michael Jordan era and the rain. He is the coach of the Golden State Warriors. Many more championships. I assume he's going to be a GM and he's going to win many, many more championships in that way. And his sole purpose is to keep the nicks from ever smiling, ever touching joy.

But what a lovely person. Oh my goodness. You don't expect that. You know what it looked like for me? So Steve Kerr to me has Phil Jackson's resume, right? Won some championships as a player. Wasn't the main guy like Phil Jackson. Won some championships as a coach.

You're not the player, but you're the architect of some of that thing. What he lacks is Jackson's doucheiness in any way. Like none of it. Oh, we got here fast. He doesn't. Do you understand what I'm saying? The city of Chicago is going to attack John. They understand.

Yeah, I think John's drawn a line in the sand with the city of Chicago. By the way, he wasn't ever douchey when he was with the nicks. That's a Chicago Bulls thing. They doucheied him up. Phil Jackson was a mensch. When he was the sixth man on the nicks, when they were in the championship, you couldn't find a nicer, more humble individual. And then Chicago got in his head, fucked him all up.

And the sixth man is always the nicest guy on the team. That's what it stands for. If you're a sixth man, that means you're like, no, you, you, you. You guys have fun. In like, in a Miss America thing, is that like a miscongeniality? I think so. I think the sixth man is a miscongeniality. Okay, definitely.

That makes sense. Eric, you play basketball. Don't lie to these people. That's true. I play basketball and it's all six minutes. Me and a bunch of comedy writers on Sunday mornings we play, and you have never seen a slower, more congenial game of basketball in your life. I'm going to tell you, so years ago, and I wrote for Gary Shanley on Larry Sanders,

and he would always have a basketball game at his house on a Sunday. You can invite all the comics out there. And when I tell you the quality of play, so here's how the games generally went. Al Franken. Al Franken was Isaiah Thomas. No, if a senator, if a senator is crossing you up, you have a problem. Crossing you up, and it was always the same game.

It was, uh, asthmatic out of breath until Kevin Nealon would show up, and he was Wilt Chamberlain. Yeah, he's, he's big in the post. So he would just, he would just fill the paint. But those games, like, were the funnest, least athletically talented. I love that, uh, Comedians League, if you're 6'4", you're a center. Last week, we had a moment where me and, uh, another, you know, that thing in basketball where, like, the ball might have gone off either guy, and they're both like,

it went off the other guy. Except what we did is we're like, I think, I think it went off me. I think you should, and he's like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm pretty sure it went off me. I think you should take it. Can I just say that's what I want Wilt to look like? No, no, no. I think it's, no, no, no.

No, no, no, no, no, no. Oh, I didn't know. Did I keep you from mousing? Now, but you're still young and hailed, so you still play, uh, but you're not a particularly tall individual. No, no, no, no. In a Comedy Writers League, we need to make sure that this is all to scale. In a Comedy Writers League, I have hands.

So, are you a 2? Are you a 3? What are you, uh, do you, do you stretch the court? The ball runs through me. The ball goes through me and it goes right out of bounds. By the way, in a Comedians League, generally, it's the snacks that run through you. Generally, there are digestive issues in a Comedians League.

It was maybe the first week that we were in the office. Henrik, like, was bragging about having hops. And I was like, yeah. I wasn't. Rob was bragging for me. And then I was like. Rob was saying you had hops. Rob was saying I had hops.

So I was like, Henrik, you know, Henrik got some bounce. And I was like, nah. And then Henrik on his phone, because he was so proud, had a video of him getting rimmed. Okay. Which? I don't, no, I don't, you know, I don't need to see a video. What is the master of the dead rimmed?

Do you want to take that back? As the only queer person here, I stand by what I said. It was a beautiful video of Henrik getting rimmed. All right. I said, fellas, first week here, here's me getting some rimmed. But. You know what's amazing is my parents are going to be like, so Henrik was on the podcast.

We're going to, we're going to listen to it. We're going to have everyone over. We're going to make a little food. We're going to listen to the podcast. And it's going to be 20 minutes of like. Can I tell you this? And I don't, and I say this again, this is not to donk you. But I imagine your parents being so pleasant as to be

two humble figures in a curio cabinet. And when you visit them, they actually live in the cabinet and you just open it and you take them both out. They're going to pop out of the cuckoo clock and listen to this. You know, Henrik was delivered by the store. That's how pure they are. John, they sent the office, this isn't a joke. They sent the office popcorn and he was like,

just because they like to do stuff like that. No, John sent us popcorn, but I was worried that it was my parents until I found out. The popcorn came in and I was like, my parents sent us popcorn. Someone was like, John sent everybody popcorn. Mike Royce used to have a great joke about when he was in school and he'd be sitting in school and all of a sudden over the the loudspeaker would go, Mike Royce,

can you please report to the office? Your mother is here with your snow pants. With your snow pants. And that's a thing as an adult. You're like, that is so beautiful. And as a child, you're like, just put a bullet in that. When did that turn? Do you, now, now you love them unconditionally, but did you,

did you eye roll them at any point in the earlier days? Oh, sure. Sure. Yeah, yeah, I think so. Yeah, but you were a little nerd the whole time. I was a nerd the whole time, yeah. Which I think, I think I performatively eye rolled to be like, God, my parents sent.

What? I like reading books with swear words. It's really like, my parents, they're the worst. Love you guys. But also the fact that you still chose to read and not like just look at Pornomax, you guys are like, yeah, I like dirty books. I mean, they cursing.

I was mad at faking it. You guys read those Dirk Pitt novels? They're sex scenes. I gotta tell you, this is Henry and Kerr, I think cut from the same cloth. They're very similar, pleasant, you know what I mean? I think it's a very similar like. The offense runs through both of them.

I think the offense runs through both of them. And both have that thing where you're just like, yeah, that's, I bet, what soundtrack is playing in their house? I bet it's always Christmas music. I bet it's always some version of a peanut's Christmas. Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun… That's a good apple. My family knows all the words too.

Good apple plug, John. Are they on Apple property now? Yeah. Snoopy has his own apples plus TV show. Does he really? Yeah, I think we should. Is it a public affairs show? We'll be.

Is he on my territory? All right, so let's get back to Steve Kerr. Do you guys know Steve Kerr? Are you fans of Steve Kerr? So I think that we both like met Steve Kerr like in different ways. Like I met him yesterday at the office, but Henry has like a different history with Steve Kerr.

I don't have a history with Steve Kerr. You've met Steve Kerr. No, I met him yesterday. So I came from Second City and he is a known person on Second City because when he was playing for Chicago, he would come and watch. And now as the coach of the Warriors, whenever he goes back to Chicago,

he goes and watches a show and they let him come and do the improv. So do you understand? We're talking about a man so nice. He likes improv. Improv. Because he's a yes and. Because he's a yes and guy.

Steve Kerr is a yes and. Here's what Steve Kerr does. And you can hear it on the microphone. A lot of times like Draymond will be like, we have got to get the ball to the corner. You've got to let Steph hit one. And then Steve Kerr always a yes and. So he's going to come on.

Here's Steve Kerr and our conversation. We are here. It is our great honor to have Steve Kerr who is joining us. World champion with the Chicago. Was it the Bulls? Is that? Bulls, yeah.

The Bulls. That's correct. And now also a world champion with the Golden State Warriors. And has just announced coming to the New York next. It's really exciting news that we're breaking here. I'm just going to start very quickly and say, how dare you have one bad year, maybe two. You lose Clay Thompson.

You lose Kevin Durant. And you're 11 and two. Onyx is onyx. Yeah. Yeah. We're trying to write the ship. Now we, man. Remember you're talking to a Nick fan.

I know. I know I'm trying. I'm going to be nice. All right. You know, I almost became the next coach. I remember. Yeah. Eight years ago.

That's right. Phil Jackson was the GM. And you know, that was my guy. And very intriguing. But when the Warriors come along and they've got Steph Curry and Clay Thompson, Draymond, it's kind of hard. It must have been a very nice situation for you. Worked out pretty well.

Steph Curry was so intriguing. Draymond Green was so intriguing that you felt that you had to. Yeah. But I mean, I talked to coaching friends of mine. And they all said the same thing. They said, your talent is everything and coaching. And it's true. I mean, I remember saying, well, you know, Phil Jackson is my guy.

And one of my good friends said, which job do you think Phil would take? I was like, oh, man. And that kind of got me because, you know, think about it. Phil Jackson takes the bull's job when he's got Michael Jordan, Scotty Pippen, and his career takes off. Pat Riley takes the Laker job when he's got Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. We're all dependent on our talent as coaches.

And the Warriors were already good. You know, they were a 51 team. They got all this young talent. So I honestly, if I'd taken the next job, I would have been spun through that cycle and been gone in two years, guaranteed. Really? Yes.

Yeah. So was it, in your mind, was it, Golden State just happened to be in a prime position because they had drafted, and what was Steph, the eighth pick? The seventh, I think? Seventh pick. I can't remember if the Knicks were the next pick. I think they might have been the next pick.

They were the next pick, yeah. And we picked a guy at that point. He was only 5'2", and he was a little out of shape, not in the league anymore, but super close. Nice guy, too. I think he's a butcher in Brooklyn. He used to get blocked by Mugsy Bokes. You play, obviously, on the great championship teams

with Jordan, the Chicago Bulls. By the way, the year that he didn't play, the Knicks were allowed to go to the finals out here. And we really appreciate. Seven-game series with the Bulls that year. That was, uh... It was, but it was close. It was, yeah, it was tough.

That was a tough loss for us. It was, and I felt, honestly, just really bad for you guys. Yeah, I did. I just thought, like, oh, they're so used to winning. They probably don't know what this feels like, and then I wanted to come over and be like, oh, guys, you need a hug or anything like that? Well, we're going to go and we've got a championship to lose.

You know, you saw Phil Jackson coach that team, but it was a Michael Jordan superstar team. So how much sway does a coach have in a league? Like, basketball is different than any other sport because there's so few players. Yeah, I think you have to walk a fine line being a coach in the NBA these days. And you have to...

And this is what Phil was really good at. This is what Greg Popovich was great at, too. People have to know you're in charge. The players have to feel that. They have to respect that. But they have to feel that you're collaborating with them. And it's more so now than ever. But even back then, Phil and MJ were collaborators.

You know, Phil would lead the team with Michael, and he would empower people. He would put his foot down when he had to. He was an amazing communicator. So there was this feeling of, all right, we're doing this together. And that's how I tried to coach the Warriors. It's a collaboration with Steph and Draymond,

Andre Godalla, who's back. I seek his advice almost daily. And but you can't appear weak either. You can't appear like you don't know what you're talking about. So it's an interesting balance. But I give them a ton of freedom because basketball, first of all, is a game of improvisation, collaborative improvisation, if that makes sense.

And then it's a game of joy. I mean, and that's where I think we have really gotten it right with the Warriors. Like there's this sense of joy with our fans, with Steph, with our team. And if you reach this sort of flow state where things are going well and their pace is happening and everybody's going crazy, it's beautiful.

It's beautiful to watch. But you got to pull back every once in a while. So you mentioned something, it was an interesting word that I hadn't heard used as a Nick fan. You said joy. As a Nick fan, I'm unfamiliar with that. So explain it again. Because it doesn't look like it looks more like,

I don't want to say scrum. It looks more like a scrum. Why is it in a basketball game? Because it is when any team is in a flow, you can't believe how it all felt so effortless and connected. And maybe two minutes later, it's just guys like bonking heads. Yeah, yeah. Or the next night, you can't throw it in the ocean.

And it's a funny game that way. It's a game of momentum. You're constantly trying to make good decisions based on the skills that you practice every day. But you also don't want to impede the guys. You don't want them overthinking. So there's this gray area that we call it fast, loose, and disciplined. And that's a contradiction, loose and disciplined.

But that's the balance we're looking for. No, it makes sense. It's that idea of structure. Enough structure that it can be routinized and you can have expectations, but that there's room in there for oxygen and inspiration and those kinds of things. Yes, but inspiration and oxygen also require mistakes, right?

Otherwise, you don't have the inspiration and the oxygen. Was it more challenging after you'd had some success or were the years where the expectation was lower more challenging? Or was it the pandemic and social issues more challenging? Or does it all come into a mix for you? Yeah, I think that's the fun part of coaching, honestly, is that every season is like a new beginning. And you sense right away where your team is kind of in the hierarchy

and where you are spiritually, mentally, because every year is different. And that's what makes it fun. But in the seven years that I've coached, undoubtedly, the most fun was year one because the expectations were low and we won the championship. And that sort of dichotomy was just amazing. And then you probably felt this during your career.

You do something long enough and you're on top of the mountain and it gets to be more work than joy. It's an expectation. It is. It is. You know, it's funny. Steve Martin, he, if you remember, he started doing stadium shows and he did the jerk

and he did all this. And I remember reading in his book that he got to a point where he felt like, I can't live up to the expectation or even nostalgia that people have of my act and I'll never be able to. So I'm done. And he walked away from stand-up. Yeah, yeah.

But interestingly, people in that space have gone back like Jerry Seinfeld, right? Like after all that success. Well, he never, he was always a craftsman. You know, it was funny. I don't know what the analogy to him would be in the NBA, but a guy who was just, I guess you would think of him as a gym rat, like a guy who's just.

Just loves it. Just loves it. Loves it. Yeah. And I thought, I've always said him, I think you did it right, which was you created a show that was existed in a moment in time, but it had syndication right.

I was the idiot who did a topical show. Right, right. I got to be there for the next 30 years if we're going to stay with this thing. That's right. That's right. When you're the coach, you're of the team, but you're not the team.

Are you considered management or one of the guys? How do you tow that line? And especially in a league like that, where it's superstars. Yeah. It's a, that's a great question. It's somewhere in between one of the guys in management, and we tried to create a culture where everybody feels like they matter, not just on the court,

but we try to celebrate people's individual achievements, but also things going on in their personal life if they're having children, if they're getting married, whatever it is. So we really try to get to know your players on a deeper level. And again, that's something that Phil Jackson and Greg Popovich were the best at in my mind, because if you really know someone and you trust them, it's a lot easier to work together

through the inevitably difficult periods. It brings up an interesting point though. So it's, you know, you look to Jackson and Popovich, two other like, they're white guys. You're a white guy, like, but you're in a league now that is overwhelmingly black. Does that divide, create difficulties? And for you to feel like you're at a remove

that you'll never be able to understand, especially during the times of social unrest and after George Floyd. Yeah, I just interact with every player on a really personal level and connect with that player. And that's what I try to do with our guys. And that breaks down a lot of walls for sure. But then you also have to have the awareness

as a white guy in a black man's game, that you don't know how these guys feel in certain circumstances. And so being aware of that, you know, if you try to pretend like you know everything, they'll see right through that. But if you admit to your frailties, to your different perspective that you have growing up as a white person, and you actually talk about all those things,

then the walls start to come down. And that's the beauty of sports really, is, you know, you get people from all over the world collaborating and coming together and playing. But I will say that when the George Floyd murder happened and the social justice march really began, that was a real reckoning for me as someone who thought I knew more than I did about black life.

I've played since junior high with mostly black teammates. And so my thought was always, oh, I think I understand, you know, black life. And then George Floyd hits and I realize, I need to start reading, I need to start learning. And I spent all last year reading a ton of great books, you know, The New Jim Crow, Cast, books like that, that are for white people.

It's like, this is must read stuff. Because there's nuanced stuff in there that you never think. For example, the idea that a black parent has to treat his child in a much more aggressive manner in order to protect that child from what's out there. My heart just sort of dropped thinking about that. As a father of three, you know, like a police car would drive by our house.

I didn't think anything of it. And then all of a sudden when you start really looking into things and learning and reading and hearing stories, it's like, man, I was really ignorant. Did you address it openly? Like, did you pull everybody together and go, look, I may not have a sense of what's actually going on in your hearts and minds right now,

but tell me what you think we should do or I should do or any of those things? We've, what we've done is we've had a lot of guest speakers come in. We had Tommy Smith come in. The sprinter raised his fist in the 68 Olympics. We had Brian Stevenson, civil rights lawyer, just to spark conversation. And then from there, you know, you start opening up

and absolutely you share stuff like that. You see, it's so interesting to me because I keep thinking, you know, after George Floyd and BLM movement, so much of the white response is, boy, we've got to start listening and learning. But it's funny, I was watching old Dick Cabot shows and James Baldwin was on and he was saying the same thing. And so I started rolling back into history a little bit

and something occurred to me, which was, oh, we've never listened. They've actually been saying the same thing since Frederick Doug, since all these hundreds of years back. And I'm wondering, is the racial conversation we need to have not, oh, let's learn from black people, or is it white people have to really sit down and have the conversation of, why is this not sinking in? Why are we still a resentful and resistant culture?

It's not like we're learning anything new. It's been shouted from the hilltops for centuries. Yeah, there's a great book about James Baldwin called Begin Again. The title explains it. Black people are constantly having to begin again because they've been telling us for 400 years what's happening, but America isn't listening.

Doc Rivers during the bubble a year and a half ago after George Floyd had one of the most amazing post-game press conferences. He said, as black Americans, we love America, but America won't love us back. It's exactly what you're talking about with Dick Cabot and James Baldwin. We've been talking about this forever. So now you fast forward to critical race theory.

I mean, because really, to me, all that means, all critical race theory is, let's actually study this, and let's look at real African-American history, and let's teach our young people about the horrors of slavery and the African-American experience, and that suddenly becomes a political tool where it's like, why would you tell your five-year-old that he's a bad person?

That's not what we're talking about. By the way, their five-year-old may be a bad person. Well, that's true. They may very well be. But that's what I'm saying. I wonder if there's a different approach which teaches, maybe goes through and questions, why has it been so hard?

It seems to be white people not reckoning with what the resistance is. So I don't know if it's, if there's maybe a framework around that, and maybe your experience, you've thought about this a little bit, but what is the conversation in white society that needs to take place absent of black people

having to tutor us on the evil? Like, the fact that you've got to ever sit down with somebody and go like, look, man, I'm telling you, slavery was bad. Like, it wasn't good. Yeah. But to answer your question, why can't white people have this conversation,

I think it's really difficult to look at the horrors of the past and admit to them for the vast majority of people. There's a guilt. I think there's a horror at what we've done. Is there, or is the resentment of having to talk about it if you didn't think it was you? This sense of, come on. You know, we gave you the right to vote.

I'm not enslaving you. Right, right. What do you think that was? I'm just trying to raise my family. That's right. I don't have privilege. I'm poor too. Which, by the way, people's lives are hard.

Mitch McConnell, about a year ago, was asked about reparations, and he said, well, we're not responsible for what happened, 300 years ago, 400 years ago. What we are responsible for is what's here and now. And as you said, structural racism exists everywhere. And so it's much harder for a black person to make the same leap as a white person in any profession. Sometimes I'll have white friends ask me, they'll say, well,

what about Obama became president, you know, or what about LeBron James being the most popular athlete? It's like, yes, but do you realize how exceptional those people had to be to rise through this structure that we have put in place over the last few hundred years that subdues that sort of rise? And so, whereas for white people, there's a lot of people out there who are wildly successful who aren't really that impressive. Are you saying there's been a rise of mediocrity in the white community?

That's shocking. I almost think the trauma is deeper, because imagine for somebody like LeBron James, as much success as he's had, as hard as he works, somebody still wrote the N-word on his gate in Los Angeles. It really is a minefield, and I admire it, but it is like, you know, I look at the structure. I was talking to Kishan Johnson a while back,

and I was saying, you know, football, Vic Fangio, I guess, was the, he's the head coach of the Denver Bronx. And during this time, he was saying, you know, the locker room's a meritocracy, and I look out there and I see, you know, people are in here because their talent demands it, and they win their positions. And I was like, yeah, I don't have to talk about the locker room. Turn around at the owner's blocks.

Yeah. That's where the structural part is. Yeah, yeah, that's right. But it's so hard to permeate. Yeah, yeah. He was saying that he didn't think that black ownership had the kind of resources that you could buy into an NBA franchise, because I really think the fight for equality doesn't happen

until the fight for equity is more even. That's always been my position, because otherwise, it's too unbalanced in negotiation. I guess this is kind of my point about how a person, a black person has to be so exceptional to rise, right? To permeate that, yeah. Yeah, to permeate. And so thinking of that at the corporate level,

you know, the world is dominated by white men, right? So I don't know the answer. Yeah, changing those tributaries. Of the top, I don't know how many billionaires there are in the cut. Now there's probably hundreds, but of the 20 richest Americans, how many black people, men or women. Yeah, and how do you change that?

We found even in a smaller way here in television, right? So television was not, even if you look around now, and you go like, oh, that's a pretty diverse workplace. 10 years ago, not even close to this. And a lot of it was, you didn't realize the internships weren't paid. So if you weren't already ahead in life, in other words, if your parents weren't ahead, you couldn't get an internship.

You couldn't afford to take a job for no money and live in the city. And then when the show was hiring, who would they choose from? The interns. Yeah, the interns, right. So it perpetuated. And until you started paying the interns and changing the tributaries, right? And it's...

Think how many ways that is manifested, right, societally. Think about financial institutions, who they hire from certain colleges. And then those colleges, though, are feeders, and they don't look in other places. It feels like for the black community, there has to be a kind of dealing with the trauma, right? But in the white community,

I almost wonder where the resentment and resistance is from. And I almost wonder if it's resource guarding. And there's this sense that these resources are being given to those people, even though I didn't have anything to do with it, and that's being taken away from me. That's 100% out there. And it's being exploited politically.

That's the biggest problem. Right. It's being used as a political tool for power, this idea of resentment. And I mean, that's not a new take, obviously, but it's directly related to racism and why things remain the way they are. Do you think there is a positive change that's going to occur?

Because to my mind, it feels like we're regressing. And in your travels and talking to people, is there optimism, or are you feeling a certain resignation from people? No, I think there's optimism. There's a lot of great work being done in the grassroots. One of the things the NBA Coaches Association did was every coach and team connected

with a local grassroots community service organization that's dealing with African-American life. People are doing amazing stuff out there. So from that perspective, there's a lot of hope. And there's also a lot of corporate help where the hope starts to fade is in what you just talked about. The politics sort of drive a lot of where we're heading, you would think, and the politics are so intertwined

with this exact dynamic you're talking about. And it just feels like we can't get anywhere politically, even though there's all these people on the ground who are doing great work and so many wonderful people who care and who are passionate about creating a more equitable country. Is part of the problem that people don't have enough experience with those that they would consider others?

And is that right? That's what Brian Stevenson talked to our team about. He said, people need proximity. They need to actually get to know someone who is going through the pain of whatever societal ills are reaching them. It's great to write a check. It's great to send money to a charity, whatever.

But when you actually connect with a human being, it's powerful. Steph and Clay and I went about a year and a half ago to Oakland to a gun violence prevention program that's in place there. It's one of the most amazing nights of our lives. We were all pretty much in tears at the end of it. But this group, it's a group called Live Free in Oakland.

Pastor Mike McBride runs this gun violence prevention program. What they're doing is they're getting everybody who's involved in local gun violence. Police, gang members, social workers, mentors, the mayor. You get all these people to sit around a table once a month. And everybody gets to talk. And so we're sitting there. Steph and Clay and I are sitting there.

And we're hearing first from the young men who were involved in gun violence and gun violence. We're hearing their personal stories. This is why I'm in a gang. This is why I committed this act. I was wrong, but this is what my life is like. Then you hear from the policeman. The policeman says, well, in the past,

we were rewarded for the number of arrests we've made. The social workers talk about the mentoring process. There's a mentor over here, right? And so the collaboration in this group is so beautiful to watch. And it literally, it's touching every single aspect of the people involved. And by the end of the night, you care about every single person in that room.

And there's a humanity to it. And it's like, okay, now we can get somewhere. Is there a way to scale that up or make those solutions global? Or do we need midnight basketball for white resentment? You know what I mean? Get white people to come in and play and be like, just call it like, you mad, bro?

And just like everybody believes you. Be like, don't be mad. Nobody, you weren't going to get into that school anyway. Just relax. All right, right. I mean, it's a great question. There's so much to this. And you have to start somewhere.

And you think about all the different organizations that are out there that are trying to help when groups can start to collaborate with city government. And you actually start making progress in a large group. Then you see a real impact made. But no question, it's a huge challenge. How much is ownership a part of connecting with these issues? Every NBA organization has a community foundation

that's raising a ton of money and trying to connect in the community. I think there's a focus now, an awareness from franchises that we've got to connect with our own city. Having said that, beyond that, every individual owner has his own agenda, his own charities, his own political beliefs. And so there's always kind of a balance in there somewhere.

And the big controversy in basketball now is sure. Everybody will speak about the injustices of America and race, but nobody will talk about China because that's where their money is. And how real is that? And how much is that calculation? A capitalist calculation, on the right, there's a sense if LeBron speaks up. Shut up and dribble, right?

Have players not speak up about American injustice. In other words, what they're saying is, unless you're going to speak equally about every injustice, then we're not going to listen to you about this injustice. And I wonder if it's cynical. I think so. I got embroiled in this two years ago. And at this point, when we would come to our pregame media,

we were being asked about every aspect of political life. Oh, I'm sure. There was nothing about pick and roll coverage. It was all about, what do you think about the latest in China? And it was probably my low point as a coach in terms of my response. It was kind of ashamed of my response. Oh, really?

Yeah, because I didn't take a stand. And so people rightly criticized me. And actually, President Trump criticized me in his... Did he really? Yeah, in the next day. Oh, that's so not like him. No, I was so shocked. Yeah, generally, just kind...

I believe that he's the Johnny Appleseed of kind words. That's right, that's right. But what a weird experience for me, yeah. Was it a social media frenzy where you canceled? Was that the kind of feeling that it was? Yeah, so I wasn't engaged with that issue on social media, but I had engaged in a lot of other political and social issues and social media retweeting articles or things that I saw that I believed in.

I've been really open about gun violence in America and I've made a lot of enemies on that issue. And so I've been... Although for clarification, your family suffered devastating loss. Your father was... Yeah, my dad was killed in Lebanon as a political assassination in 1984. And so my family and I have all been really passionate about gun safety and trying to make a push for smarter gun laws in this country.

But when I started speaking out on it, I became that guy. And so then people would ask me about other stuff. So when they came and asked me about China, I was totally unprepared. I gave a terrible answer and it was embarrassing. And it was a good reminder that you talk about stuff publicly, you got to be prepared for everything that's coming your way. Certainly basketball, the coaches, I mean,

are much more outspoken when it comes to social issues, much more comfortable talking about the media than any other sport that I've ever seen. It's not as tenuous or dangerous a place for a coach to speak out. We talk everything out as a team. And we've got guys who are really outspoken. I mean, Traymond Green's got an opinion on everything. I've not noticed that, Traymond.

I did the shop with him and LeBron and all that. And by the end of that, I was like, Traymond, I'm sorry. Exactly. No, we encourage our guys to be really frank and open and outspoken, if that's what they want, or if they don't feel comfortable. And we try to provide resources. I mean, it's a tricky one. I'd always felt that social media had almost a physical weight.

And we were part of that ecosystem. The Daily Show, so much of media is incentivized for the most conflict, something out of context. They're looking for the nugget that's going to create the largest blast radius. So we made a show every day, but it wasn't so much, Twitter wasn't really a thing at that point or it was just starting. Now, boy, when I came back, I was surprised at the ferocity of it, the ubiquity of it, and how much you really do realize, oh, I can't really engage in this

if I want to maintain that internal barometer of moral direction that I think I have. I quit Twitter in March, and it's been blissful. Has it really? Yeah, I mean, it's... That's good, because I've been adding you and no response. It's a little disappointing. No, I saw your... But do the guys get...

I mean, they're playing a game, and if they miss a three-pointer at the buzzer, my guess is, boy, they're going to get hit with vitriol in a way that is appalling. Danny Green was playing for the Lakers in the bubble finals against Miami, missed a potential game winning shot, series winning shot, I think, like in game five. Got death threats on social media, death threats that day. And then was interviewed about it the next day, and had... And then has to answer all those questions and then go back out and play. And it's never been harder to be a professional athlete than it is right now.

These guys have their phones at their fingertips. They've got criticism and judgment coming their way every single minute. And it's hard to put that down, especially when you've been raised with... I do know that when I walk in at halftime of every game, every guy's on his phone. At halftime. At halftime. Yeah. No.

Yes. Yes. Wait, really? Yeah. Yeah. So when do they have the orange slices? You still do orange slices, right? Yeah, it's orange slices.

Kind of orange slices. Pretzel sticks. That's right. Got to have a little bit of orange slice, little pretzel stick, little bit of water. And your phone. As soon as I walk in, generally, they put the phones down. A couple minutes. And this is...

I've talked to my fellow coaches. It's league-wide. It's... And by the way, in 2021, if you tried to be the coach, like, no phones in the locker room on game night, you're not going to stick around. You don't even bother going down that path. So you try to use humor. Walk in and, hey, anybody say anything good about my coaching on Twitter?

First tap? That's nice. Or, hey, what's... It's your girlfriend, Pappy, with your perf... You know, and then they just kind of laugh when you put the phone down. And, you know, it's just... Have you tried tweeting out halftime instructions so that maybe when they're on the phone? That's good.

That'd be really good. All right. Final question. How far away are the Knicks? And let's just go two time horizons. My lifespan and the Knicks getting past, let's say, the second round of the playoffs, I'm 58. So if I hang in there, start juicing, and if I know the Knicks are good, I will hang on.

Yeah, for longer. Will I be on, let's say, dialysis? Or, like, where will I be in before the Knicks in your mind are in that position? You know, we were just talking about Twitter. I don't know if you're aware of this, but if I answer this question, Yes. It's a decent chance. Yes.

A lot of people are going to be tweeting about it. On Twitter, yes, that's correct. Yeah, and it might... Generally positive things. Might be a little embarrassing for me. So, yeah. Would Steph ever be bored of this winning that you're doing and think to himself, why doesn't a superstar think to himself, I'm going to take this 50-year terrible burden

that's been on the Knicks fans, and I'm going to carry them to the promised land? Why wouldn't... What about you instead? Okay, listen to this. What if you and Steph... There's got to be some sort of avatar, tiki, something that if you touch it and Steph touches it at the same time I and Spike Lee touch it, surely we can infuse... But mainly Steph.

Yes, mainly Steph. Okay. All right, fair enough. If it's going to take magic, it's probably not worth it. Thank you very much for joining us. Thank you. So, we're back. I've just finished the conversation with Steve Kerr.

It was fantastic. I'm so happy that y'all were able to talk about race in a way that was meaningful, but also talk about the most important issue, the Knicks, because I was worried that we weren't going to get enough Knicks talk. It's very hard for me to talk about anything in basketball that's not the Knicks, and it's very interesting to have a guy like Steve Kerr who had so much success as a player and as a coach and have that all. It really is like when your friend would come back from somewhere and had gone on vacation,

but you hadn't. And so the whole time you just have to sit there like, really? Beach. Oh, and you snorkeled. No. Oh, that sounds good. Yeah, that's interesting because we had crackers for 50 years. Hey, Tom Thibodeau has a name.

Don't call him that. His name is Crackers. That's what they call him. Hey, Crackers. He's like a parrot. I thought it was very interesting. The thing that came out of it for me and I think has to be pursued is the conversation of our race has to be amongst white people.

That it's enough already asking people to edge because it's that whole thing of like, it's time for white people to step back and really listen. And you're like, really? Because I think they've been saying the same thing for about 400 years now. It's clearly not sinking in. The white people have to get in a room and be like, hey, what's wrong with us? Are we like dense?

And Steve Kerr is a good place to start. Greg Popovich is a good place to start. Like there are, and I will never give someone like an invitation to one of these like hypothetical cookouts, but there are certain white people in predominantly black spaces like the NBA, where black people see them and go, hey, maybe they don't get all of it. But at least they said, I'm listening. And a few head coaches who have been white have done that. The least you can do.

For the bare minimum. To be like, oh, I'm ignorant. Yeah, yeah. Like he was just like, I'm ignorant. And not even in a way that like makes you seem like you're trying super hard. He doesn't want to get any praise for it. He even talked about the fact that he can put his foot in his mouth when it comes to like other stuff politically.

But like, it was just so good to hear someone say, that's why I should at least be able to say I'm listening. Like him talking about doing the stuff in Oakland with Clay and Steph in regards to like gun violence. I'm like, that's actually, that's one of those things that's at the cross section of like gun violence and racial economics issues. So like when he says, oh, I want to do something about this, like he's actually doing it. That's, that's what you want to hear. You don't hear, I want to see someone, because the opposite of that is someone being like,

did y'all know I could do the electric slide? And I'm like, I don't, I don't need that. All right. So we're going to cancel the second segment, which was just me doing the slide. We talked to the soldier boy. You have to do it on camera. I don't know what that is. I don't, but it sounds quite militant.

I'll tell you what, you teach me the soldier boy and I will teach you the horror. Oh, the horror. John, every time we talk, you know, I've been to bar mitzvahs. Have you been to bar mitzvahs? I found the two Jewish people in Mississippi and I befriended them. I think it's a wise choice. What was a bar mitzvah in Mississippi? Just out of curiosity.

It was fun. A lot of fried food. See, back in the day, before bar mitzvahs became a thing, you just did them in the back of the synagogue. You did your thing. You had to read from the Torah and then everybody would have like pound cake and you go in the back room. But now today, it's- Nicki Minaj goes to that.

It's a prom. Yeah. Not even a prom. It's more like a demonstration of Gatsby. It's basically like saying, the Jews have arrived and we are going to dazzle you with the access. The Jews have arrived. What chapter of Harry Potter is that in?

That's one of- 00:46:47,920 --> 00:46:49,200 That's where they get to Gringots, right? Can I tell you something about Harry Potter? That is a wild thing. You don't have to use this, but this is true. Here's how you know- Uses.

Like, Jews are still where they are. So, talking to people. I was like, have you ever seen a Harry Potter movie? Like, I love the Harry Potter movies. Like, you ever see the scenes in Gringots Bank? And they're like, I love the scenes in Gringots Bank. He's like, do you know what those folks that run the bank are? And they're like, what?

And they're like, Jews. And then that person says, no goblins. That's a caricature of a Jew from an anti-Semitic piece of literature. And J.K. Rowling looked at that and went, can we get these guys to run our bank? And you're like, it's a wizarding world. It's a world where it's like- You can imagine anything.

I truly, I was like 11 or 12 and was like, I love Harry Potter. And I remember like being in the theater and being like, this kind of fucked up. It might have been the first time I said the F word. I was like, 11 year old Henry does not swear. I was like, ooh. It was one of those things where I saw it on the screen and I was expecting the crowd to be like, holy shit.

She did not in a wizarding world just throw Jews in there to run the fucking underground bank. And everybody was just like wizards. Even Dobby was like, that's fucked up. Those are Jews. Dobby's like, Dobby, Dobby doesn't have anything against Jews. Dobby doesn't understand. Yeah, Dobby Tubman, the first freed slave.

Dobby Tubman, leading us to freedom. Y'all ain't celebrating elf history month? Anyway, the conversation was good. And Harry Potter's a great series. And that is our show everybody. Thank you so much for listening. For more content from the problem, check out our newsletter.

You can subscribe at theproblem.com. You can also check out the Apple TV Plus show. It's really the mothership. It's the mothership of all this delicious content. It's the industrial kitchen by which we make these things and then distribute it through a series of events. Yeah, it's like when you go, did you make the podcast in-house and you go, it was made in a house.

Yeah. We're in John's house. Yeah. Thank you. Those are the pictures. You're in my house. You live here. We will be back next week.

Next week is going to blow your mind. It's a special mail bag episode. We answer some question that people send to us from the hotline. Oh, yeah. And I can tell you this, many of them end with the phrase, fuck you, John Stewart. I was going to say that had to be hard for you. It was not.

It was filled with joy and we are delighted. Thank you guys very much. Thank you. And we will see everybody next time. This is fun. The Private John Stewart podcast is an Apple TV plus podcast and a joint bus boy production.