Dallas Mavericks star Kyrie Irving appeared to humiliatingly snub Memphis Grizzlies’ Dillon Brooks’s attempts to swap jerseys Monday night but he claimed it wasn’t intentional.
The Grizzlies eked out a 112-108 win against Irving and the Mavericks Monday and following the game, a clip of Irving rejecting Brooks’s jersey swap attempt went viral.
Brooks could be seen stripping his jersey off before Irving congratulates him on the win postgame and then appears to hold it out to the guard for him to take after they finish embracing.
However, Irving, reportedly having already given his strip to Brooks, just walked away from the outstretched arm and turned to the next Grizzlies player.
After being completely disregarded by Irving, Brooks was reportedly forced to walk around the court with two jerseys in his hand.
Kyrie Irving (center) appeared to snub Dillon Brooks’s (right) jersey swap attempts Monday
However, in his postgame press conference, Irving insisted the rejection wasn’t intentional and that he was distracted by his thought process.
‘I saw that after the game. I’ll probably get it next time. Probably next time. Not this time,’ Irving said during his postgame press conference when asked about his interaction with Brooks. ‘I was really onto the next thing, thought process-wise.’
Brooks, who appeared to briefly look up after Irving walked away from their interaction, joked that he would sign Irving’s jersey himself and put it up on his wall, according to ESPN.
The Canadian was still full of praise for Irving, despite the snub, as he compared the guard to Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan.
‘I’m a fan of Kyrie, for everything he stands for, the way he uses his platform & his basketball game,’ Brooks said, via ABC24Memphis.
‘When you’re growing up, you want to aspire to be able to do what he does. He’s just like Kobe. He’s just like Jordan. He plays the game at a different pace. He uses both hands. Midrange God. And that’s where I want to be at one day when I’ll be able to shoot the ball more.’
However, Irving’s seeming dismissal of Brooks comes after the Grizzlies player, who has earned his ‘Dillon the Villain’ nickname this season, dished out some trash talk to Irving and teammate Luka Doncic when the two Mavericks stars missed a previous game against the Grizzlies.
Fresh off his latest tussle with Draymond Green and the Golden State Warriors, Brooks hit out at Irving and Doncic after learning they would be out for the March 11 game.
Irving had already handed over his jersey but walked away when Brooks tried to hand his over
‘It’s goes to show that sometimes they ain’t ready to come back to a physical game,’ Brooks said, via Grizzlies beat reporter Damichael Cole.
‘I hope Luka gets back for the next game so I can guard him,’ he added, according to ESPN’s Tim MacMahon. ‘I didn’t get a chance to guard him the first game and he had a great game [Oct. 22 when Brooks was hurt]. So I wanna see where I’m at.’
Doncic remained out for Monday’s game but Irving scored 28 points in Dallas’s defeat.
The two teams aren’t scheduled to meet for the remainder of the 2022-23 regular season so if Irving sticks to his word, the promised complete jersey swap will have to wait until a potential playoff series or next season.
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Brooks has found himself embroiled in a number of on-court and off-court spats this season.
The snub comes after Brooks dished out some trash talk to Irving and teammate Luka Doncic
He was handed a one-game suspension in February after he caught Cleveland Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell below the belt, sparking a bench-clearing brawl.
His war of words with Golden State’s Green also got physical earlier this month after the pair tussled on the court during feisty Grizzlies-Warriors game after Green claims Brooks’s teammates didn’t like him.
Warriors’ Klay Thompson also hit out at Brooks, as he claimed that no one will ever talk about the Grizzlies forward after he retires and taunted him over his number of titles during the game.
Most recently, Brooks was fined $35,000 for ‘unsportsmanlike conduct’ after colliding with a cameraman and pushing him to the court.
