ESPN’s NBA broadcaster Mark Jones surprised Monday when he liked a video on Twitter criticizing his colleague Stephen A. Smith, using a racial epithet to defend Dallas Cowboys team owner Jerry Jones.
Bishop Talbert Swan used a video of dancing raccoons to describe Smith’s defense of Jones, who appeared on «First Take» Friday. Smith said Jones did not «deserve» to be dragged through the mud after a photo showed him being with students trying to keep an Arkansas school segregated in 1957. Jones was a teenager at the time.
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ESPN broadcaster and sports analyst Doris Burke, left, and sportscaster Mark Jones pose before calling a game during the 2022 NBA Summer League at the Thomas & Mack Center on July 9, 2022 in Las Vegas.
(Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
Early Tuesday morning, Jones had not liked the tweet, but it had already been captured on social media.
ESPN did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Jones was in the crowd of white students trying to deny access to six black students at North Little Rock High School. The event occurred just a few weeks before the Little Rock Nine integrated Little Rock Central High School less than five miles away in what turned out to be one of the most important moments in the civil rights movement.
Jones has acknowledged that it is him in the photograph, but says he did not participate in the integration protest and looked on curiously and without animosity.
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ESPN announcer Mark Jones during the NBA game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Philadelphia 76ers at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on March 23, 2022.
(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)
«I don’t know if I or anyone anticipated or had a history of knowing … what was involved,» Jones, now 80, told The Washington Post. «It was more of a curious thing.»
Stephen A. Smith during an interview on «The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon» on Thursday, September 22, 2022.
(Paula Lobo/NBC via Getty Images)
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Jones has caused a stir on social media in the past. He mocked UFC fighter Colby Covington for suffering a broken jaw because he supported Donald Trump and had fun at the expense of San Francisco 49ers star Nick Bosa after he suffered an ACL tear. Bosa also supported Trump.
Fox News’ Ryan Morik contributed to this report.