NBA players have proven once again if you attempt to expose them on social media — they will return fire.
Toronto Raptors championship-winner Danny Green went hard at a Canadian news anchor after he tweeted the prices the shooting guard was charging for autographs ($25), T-shirts ($45) and photos ($50) at his basketball clinic in Ottawa.
“Not sure if it is common for multi-millionaire NBA or professional athletes to charge their young fans for autographs and photos but this poster at the Danny Green basketball clinic was curious,” CBC’s Adrian Harewood tweeted. “For the record Raptors guard Danny Green makes $10 million/yr.”
Despite hashtag-happy Harewood’s attempt to slip that past the former Spur by not tagging his Twitter handle, Green caught him napping.
“Not sure if it’s common or not for a journalist to fangirl over someone then bash them behind their back,” Green responded. “Where was this question/issue when you were two feet away from me doing the interview? Most of my proceeds go to my employees, I put my people on not tear them down unlike yourself.”
A fan also revealed Harewood had posed for a photograph with Green.
Harewood should have flown the white flag then and there but he attempted to explain himself. “As you’ll see by my Twitter feed I wasn’t trying to bash you,” he replied. “I noticed the poster before we spoke and found it odd but didn’t think it appropriate to raise during the interview. I take responsibility for that. When it was raised by a viewer on Twitter I addressed it and tagged you.”
He was more conciliatory in a follow-up. “I made a mistake in my interview with Danny Green. I saw the poster before our chat. I considered asking him about it but didn’t want it to seem ‘aggressive’, like I was ambushing him. It would’ve changed the nature of the conversation. Still, I should’ve found an artful way to ask.”
Score that one to the Raptors, too.