Welcome to the Wire 2 Wire Podcast. Join the host Yusuf as he dives into the mainstream media's shameless promotion of LeBron James. In this episode, Yusuf unpacks the recent controversial comments by Dan Le Batard, who boldly compared LeBron to the legendary Muhammad Ali. Tune in for a thought-provoking discussion on the influence of sports media and the legacy of two iconic athletes. Don't miss out!
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https://redcircle.com/privacy Is your vehicle stopping like it should? Does it squeal or grind when you break? Don't miss out on summer break deals at O'Reilly Auto Parts. Welcome to the Wire to Wire podcast. As always, it's me, your host Yousa. Now, without further ado, let's just get right to it. So you guys see the title of this episode. You might be wondering, why am I saying this? So recently, Dan Levittard, he went on his show and he complimented LeBron by comparing him to Muhammad Ali. Now, this comparison is not even close. But to give you guys some context, I'll play what he said and then I'll share my thoughts with you afterwards. But before I do, like this video and subscribe to the channel. Alright, now here we go. Don't think we understand how unfair we've been to excellence during an era. Over the last 20 years, social media mocking people, he was always chasing Michael, always chasing Michael to see him holding that American flag. And that flag means something different than it did 20 years ago, but the thing holding it doesn't? It's still excellence for 20 years. Today's Ali. And you know how hard it is to tackle Michael Jordan as America's ultimate winner? Not even Brady could do it because he wasn't first. But we have watched for 20 years, somebody who holds that American flag in the middle of the Olympics and once upon a time, right? Because we don't treat team USA this way. We don't treat anymore what it is that we're watching of this team and make it feel like it did when it was Jordan and Barkley. But imagine Michael Jordan at the end of everything, not shooting jumpers for the wizards, older than any athlete out there and still deserving of holding the flag, how emotional you would have been watching it because you're so much nicer. Take. So you heard what Levittard had to say. Now, the glazing that he's doing is shameless. And he's not only wrong, but he's being extremely disingenuous. Now, first of all, Muhammad Ali is one of those figures that transcends their field of endeavor, right? And is also synonymous with it. So when you talk boxing, people immediately think of Muhammad Ali. It's the same impact that Michael Jordan has with basketball and that Tiger Woods has with golfing, right? And then Michael Jackson has with music and entertainment. Now LeBron James is nowhere close to that or the caliber of the people that I just mentioned. He just isn't. He doesn't have that level of global poll or appeal. He's more so propagated by the media and is a byproduct of mainstream sports media, right? That 24 seven around the clock coverage. He's more of a byproduct of that. Right. And also, he has stooges who are shills for clutch sports, allegedly, that do a lot of his bidding for him. So a lot of the hype surrounding LeBron is not even organic or authentic. Now, another aspect to take into consideration is Muhammad Ali's appeal is that he stood up for a cause greater than himself. So he refused to partake in the Vietnam War, right? He wasn't in prison for it, you know, despite the common narrative that gets pushed a lot. But he did lose years, right? He lost prime years from his boxing career and a lot of potential earnings, right? And that just goes to show the great lengths that he went to in order to uphold his beliefs and his values. So this notion that LeBron is somehow a modern day Ali. It's not only a majority of people will look back at that moment in history and would agree with his premise that it was a word that shouldn't have even occurred in the first place. But when it comes to someone like LeBron, he doesn't care about anything more than making money and getting attention for himself. Now me personally, I don't believe that he really has any morals or values or any ideologies that he holds firm belief in, and that he really advocates for it. To me, he strikes me as more of a flavor of the day type of guy. And to give you guys an example of this. He had a teammate, Aaron Noble, who during the 2006 to 2007 season was trying to raise awareness for an issue that was happening in Darfur Sudan at the time. And LeBron James refused to sign an open letter because he didn't know enough about it. Now, truthfully, if you look back at that conflict and what it involved, the reason why LeBron chose to say nothing about it is because it was against his professional and business interests. So what did he do? He chose to stick to basketball, right? Now eventually he spoke on it a year later. But to be honest, he was better off not saying anything, because he just gave a vague generic non definitive statement that really meant nothing. And honestly, normally I'm fine with that. I don't have a problem with someone staying silent. At the end of the day, people have situations and circumstances that might preclude them from being able to speak up and be vocal. It's just a reality of life, right? And I'm actually more empathetic than others might be, right? So I don't believe in that silence is violence kind of stuff. Right? I'm actually empathetic to people like that. But what I don't respect and I don't have any empathy for are really just two things. People who want to act like social justice warriors, but they practice selective outrage depending on their interests, right? Or people who speak on matters that they are not educated on. Those are my two caveats to what I said earlier. Now in the case of a LeBron, he does both. So he was someone who stayed silent on everything. Now in 2012, LeBron rebranded himself as this champion of justice and civil rights, right? But then eventually, he got his card pulled, and then he ended up embarrassing himself. So when that whole situation with Daryl Maury happened right with that whole tweet, right? LeBron wanted to act tough, call him out, but then when LeBron was told to share his opinion on the situation at hand, regarding the conflict or the internal I wouldn't even say conflict, the internal struggle between China and Hong Kong, right? When LeBron was asked to give his opinion, he basically just said, "I'm going to stay quiet and focus on basketball." Oh, so in other words, you wanted to just shut up and dribble. But when Laura Ingraham told him to just shut up and dribble, she was called a racist. Now how was that statement shut up and dribble racist? LeBron isn't a sharp or a witty guy. I've said that many times on this podcast. I highly doubt that he knows much about domestic or foreign policy, right? So what's wrong with telling someone like him to focus on his area of expertise? He's an athlete. So be an athlete. He wants to be more than an athlete when it's convenient for him and just be an athlete when it's not advantageous for him to speak up. And that's why time and time again, like we saw in that situation, he puts his foot in his mouth and he embarrasses himself. Now Michael Jordan was someone who stayed silent, not because he didn't care or he didn't have opinions. It's just that he had enough self-awareness to understand that this is not his field of expertise, right? And it's okay. He gives charitable donations to causes that matter to him. He does his own weight of economically empowering the black community through hiring practices through his business practices. You just have to go look up and see the actual work that he's done. And you'll see what I'm talking about. Now Michael Jordan is absolutely a generous person. But he just does it behind the scenes without making it spectacle or trying to seek the outside world's validation. And Muhammad Ali was someone who stood up for what he wholeheartedly believed in. And the only reason why he had to go public with his stance is because at that time, the Vietnam War was a very hot topic. Plus, if you look at the character of a Muhammad Ali, he was someone who was charismatic. He had charisma in and out of the ring. He had the ability to turn even his biggest haters into his allies. Him and Howard Cocel eventually developed some kind of professional/personal bond between them. And they used that shtick as a way to brand build for the both of them, right? Muhammad Ali was a charismatic person. He was funny. He was witty. He was gregarious. And he was engaging. That's how he became very popular as a personality which transcended, which allowed him to transcend the sport of boxing. He knew how to engage the fans and the media, right? He was a public figure and an icon. Yet he was also the people's champ at the same time. Now, I want to be very clear. LeBron is none of those things. 20 plus years in the league, and there's not a single notable quote from him like we have with a great like Muhammad Ali. Now, if LeBron was really built like a Muhammad Ali was, he would have embraced skip Bayless's trolling or any other media member that was trolling him. He would have embraced it. And he would have found a way to create a mutually beneficial partnership for both of them, or he would have went on their programs and called them out to their face and try to embarrass them, right? But instead, LeBron is so fragile and insecure that anyone in the media who criticizes him, he works behind the scenes to either get them fired, deep platform, or just outright shadow banned. He'll also push to get his lackeys promoted and into jobs at these mainstream media outlets so they can go on TV, or they can go on podcast or any of these platforms, and they can wave the pom poms and glaze him. Right? Go ask Michelle Beatle. Even go ask someone like Stephen A. Smith with the kind of interactions and runnings that he had with LeBron and his crew. Look at what the mainstream media has allowed themselves to become today. It's just LeBron glazing all the time. And that's exactly what dad Levittari is doing here. Now, after hearing his comments, I believe that he's been compromised, just like all of the other media personality that he's had been compromised allegedly. Right? Such as Nick Ray, Channel Sharp, Brian Winhorst, just to name a few. And by the way, this narrative that his fans tried to push, that when you're criticizing LeBron, or you're criticizing Bronnie because they're starting to do that with him now, that suddenly you're against black people and you're kicking a black man and putting a black man down. Man, you guys need to get out of here with that. Calling LeBron out on his BS and holding him accountable isn't hating. Right? And it's not kicking a black man down. It's not trying to bring him down or anything like that. Right? And it's very laughable that you guys even say stuff like that. In a world that glazes him, you need to have some kind of balance and you need to have a different perspective. There needs to be a counterculture that goes against the mainstream culture that's being propagated. Right? And if we're really going to talk about, you know, keeping black men down and doing harm to the black men, then let's talk about it. Goog up Paul Silas, a blackhead coach, fired. Right? Well LeBron threw Russell Westbrook under the bus, and he permanently sullied his stature within the NBA and put his playing career at jeopardy. What do you call that? When he would repeatedly disrespect the authority of Darvin Ham and publicly undermine him while throwing him under the bus to the media. What do you call that? When he would scapegoat Mario Chalmers and try to sun him on the court. What is that? When he went behind Kyrie's back to try and get him traded and proactively threw him under the bus in a press conference a couple of years ago. What was LeBron doing then? He openly advocates for Austin Reeves while treating D'Angelo Russell like garbage. When we all know that D'Angelo Russell is a significantly better player than Austin Reeves can ever imagine becoming. But D'Angelo Russell is just not a good fit as a cog in the LeBron James machine where LeBron holds and controls the ball. Right? And he reduces the players around him to nothing more than catching shoot role players. Now D'Angelo Russell was an all-star on the Brooklyn Nets. And look how LeBron treats him treats him like he's a liability, like he does harm to the team. Right? When he did a documentary, I believe it was called more than an athlete or shut up and juggle one of those things. It was, you know, it was one of those mediocre documentaries that his production companies like to put out. Right? And one of those documentaries, he was talking about Muhammad Ali and he dedicated an entire segment to tearing down Michael Jordan by saying that, oh, growing up, I was a fan of Michael Jordan, but I was always disappointed that he never spoke up on social issues. So is he not tearing down Michael Jordan? Look at all the names that I just mentioned. So you guys will say that holding him accountable and calling him out is tearing him down. But all the stuff that LeBron James did that I just mentioned and laid out here, and that's only a fraction of the stuff that he's done. You guys are going to call it that. You guys are going to say that he's tearing down black men, right? Like, you guys need to get out of here with that. As long as the mainstream media is going to sing his praises and glaze him the way that they do, I will be here. And many content creators will be here to provide a counterbalance for people that are actually interested in hearing the truth and getting a balanced perspective. But Dan Levittard, just cut the nonsense. You know this isn't true. We know this isn't true. Just stop it. But that's all I got for you guys today. Be sure to like this video and subscribe to the channel. You can also follow me and the podcast on Instagram and TikTok. You can also check out my books that the link will be in the description. Until next time. ♪♪♪ Want a website with unmatched power, speed, and control? Try Bluehost Cloud, the new web hosting plan from Bluehost. Built for WordPress creators by WordPress experts. With 100% uptime, incredible load times, and 24/7 WordPress priority support, your sites will be lightning fast with global reach. And with Bluehost Cloud, your sites can handle surges in traffic no matter how big. Plus, you automatically get daily backups and world class security. 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