Mario Hezonja dunked on Giannis Antetokounmpo. Hezonja then stepped over Giannis, who didn’t take it so well. Now, we have beef. Weird beef
Has there ever been an NBA beef between two players whose names are ultra hard to spell?
I can’t think of one, which is why the new Giannis Antetokounmpo-Mario Hezonja beef is so weird and great at the same time. Yes, you read that correctly — Giannis, one of the top NBA players in the game today, is angry at Hezonja, a player who was supposed to be at Giannis’ level, but is now a scorer off the bench.
How did this erupt? Let me explain.
On Dec. 1, the rebuilding New York Knicks nabbed one of their most impressive wins of the season by holding off the high-powered Bucks 136-134. Emmanuel Mudiay, who has keyed New York’s resurgence, led the team with 28 points. Hezonja, who started, only had two points, but it was how he got those two would matter, greatly, to Giannis.
Check out the video below, and you’ll see what I mean:
Yep, Hezonja decided to let Giannis know what happened to him by stepping over him, which is one of the ultimate signs of disrespect in the game. Giannis was not happy about that move, and in the postgame interview, he didn’t mince his words:
When Hezonja got word of what Giannis said after the game, he offered this quite to Newsday’s Steve Pepper:
One question: Where was this Hezonja in Orlando?
Anyway, the Giannis-Hezonja rivalry is now born, and, lucky for us, these two will meet again on Christmas Day at Madison Square Garden. It’s a weird beef, actually, but in the days of bromance in the NBA, we’ll take what we can get.
Oh, how we love beef and the holidays.