UPDATED 3:25 p.m. ET: Damian Lillard, who said “I ain’t got a horse in the race,” responded to Pat’s comments about Chris. “Bra on TV acting like his word law. Speaking on private convos and praying on mfs downfall. This weird behavior smh.” He also addressed someone bringing up Pat’s stats with the claim Pat’s “stats aren’t bad.”
“Cuz nobody guarding this man,” Lillard replied.
See original story below.
In an appearance on ESPN’S Get Up, Patrick Beverley ripped into Chris Paul after the Phoenix Suns were destroyed by the Dallas Mavericks in Game 7 of their hotly contested second round series.
“Man, ain’t nobody worried about Chris Paul when you play the Phoenix Suns, nobody in the NBA. … CP can’t guard anybody man. Everybody in the NBA know that,” Beverley said of his longtime rival. “You know those cones in the summer that you dribble around? What does the cone do? Nothing. He’s a cone.”
He also said Suns coach Monty Williams should have benched Paul instead of Deandre Ayton.
“They benched the wrong person, they should’ve benched Chris,” he said. “I’m not saying bench him now, once you see they started attacking Chris early, and you know that might become a problem later on, you need to see how that team works without Chris in the game a little bit.” He also suggested that he believes Chris Paul will be a Hall of Famer, but he’s certainly not impressed with his recent performance on the court.
Beverley denied that his comments are because he has “an axe to grind” with Paul. “No I’m saying all this because this is what the NBA says, and players in the NBA know this,” he explained. “I’m not the only one who says this.”
Paul and Beverley have butted heads in the past, most notably during the 2020-21 NBA playoffs when Beverley shoved the former at the end of the Clippers-Suns series.
As a result of the incident, Beverley was suspended for the first game of the 2021-22 season. He later tweeted an apology to Paul in which he said “emotions got the best of me.”