Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s Twitter crisis on Wednesday was but the first bizarre step in the ongoing saga of why the Los Angeles Lakers great does not yet have a statue at Staples Center. Kareem continued to openly discuss his frustration with the public, explaining to Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Times what had KAJ feeling disrespected before the statue even came up.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Continues Fight Against Lakers Statue Injustice
A couple years ago, they told me they had to drastically reduce my salary. They told me I had to take a pay cut at a time they’re paying Phil [Jackson] $12 million a year. To me, paying Phil really well and they can’t afford to pay me, I wasn’t anything close to that. It’s hard to believe.
Kareem goes on to say he rolled with it because it was around that time he found out he had leukemia, and he needed the medical insurance the job afforded. Abdul-Jabbar was, of course, a Lakers’ special assistant, charged with turning Andrew Bynum from a boy into a man. This arrangement was wildly successful; Bynum looks more like the future of the Lakers than anyone else on the roster. But owner Jerry Buss had sought to shrink costs; he famously had a stand-off with Jackson last year in an attempt to get the coaching legend to take $8 million instead of $12 million. (It didn’t work.)
This isn’t to say Kareem has a legitimate or illegitimate gripe. It’s just completely bizarre to see a walking legend light fire to the franchise he’s most closely tied to.
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