Emmanuel Acho Tries and Fails to Criticize Angel Reese Without Ignorance. Listen to This ...

Monday night was a watershed moment in Women’s college basketball. You missed out if you didn’t watch Iowa vs LSU in the facing-off for a chance to go to the Final Four.

But as we expected the conversation coming out of this game was more about what did not happen on the court—as Angel Reese discussed after their loss to Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes.

During the postgame press conference, she gave sports fans a peek into what she’s been going through since she won the National Championship a year ago against the same Iowa Hawkeyes.

“I’ve been through so much,” Reese said. “I’ve seen so much. I’ve been attacked so many times, death threats, I’ve been sexualized, I’ve been threatened, I’ve been so many things, and I’ve stood strong every single time.”

On Tuesday, FS1 commentator Emmanuel Ahco took an ignorant stance on Reese’s words during his show, “Speak.”

Listen to what he said below:

First and foremost, saying that you plan on taking a “gender-neutral” and “racially indifferent” take on Reese immediately disqualifies anything you say after that.

Why? It ignores the factors that have directly affected the way people treat her. People have sexualized her because she’s a woman, they label her as aggressive because she’s Black.

It’s why it’s frustrating when certain groups say “they don’t see color” when talking about Black people. You absolutely should, because people have used the color of our skin to marginalize and discriminate against us for hundreds. The same can be said with Reese.

Acho also claimed during this segment that Reese, “Can’t act like the big bad wolf, then cry like courage the cowardly dog.”

So you’re saying Reese deserves to be sexualized? Threatened?

As Torrey Smith said on X, “She never asked for sympathy on the court. She just asked to be treated like a human off of it.”

Which is why Acho’s comments are so asinine. Reese wasn’t complaining about the way people talked about her on the basketball court, she was talking about the way she is being treated off it, in the real world.

If Acho wanted to criticize her game, I could’ve lived with that, even if I sorely disagreed. But criticizing the way she carries herself is a different issue. Reese has been the same person in every setting, a beautiful outgoing Black woman who believes in herself more than anyone else.

Acho said she had to “take it on the chin” and “take the L like she’s grown.”

Did she act like a sore loser and not give Clark and the Iowa team their props? No! She wanted to be treated with respect by people who had nothing to do with the game on the court. You’re allowed to root against a team or player without being extremely racist or sexist.

I’ll be honest, I was rooting for LSU on Monday, but that didn’t mean I’m immediately given the right to speak about Clark like she’s inhuman if they win. Reese is simply asking for that same kind of treatment.

Hopefully, she will receive that when she’s playing in the WNBA next season.

Acho attempts to justify his comments

Following the criticism he’s faced on social media, Acho has attempted to justify his words by saying that he’s previously spoken out against racial & gender bias.

He wrote on X, “Please know, I always speak out on racial & gender bias. One of the few on TV to speak on it. I have also consistently publicly supported Angel through it. However, I don’t blindly support anyone. I assess every situation individually and then speak.”

He added, “Also, just because you disagree with one individual’s actions, one time, does not mean you hate them. The job is to be an analyst, not a fan. Which means your opinions must shift as actions shift.”

Yeah, not good enough. This makes what you said about Reese even more preposterous. If you’ve previously spoken out about racial and gender bias, then why ignore it now?

Your assessment of the situation with Reese was poor and instead of owning up to it, you simply said, “Well I’ve done it before.”

Either way, Acho has long frustrated people on social media. Remember, this is the same guy who sat down with a panel of white police officers after the murder of George Floyd when he should’ve spoken to the community that was directly affected by his death: Black people.

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