The NBA fined Miami Heat center Meyers Leonard $ 50,000 and suspended him from the team’s facilities and all activities for a week on Thursday after he used an anti-Semitic insult during a live stream of a video game earlier this week.
Leonard will also have to participate in a “cultural diversity program.”
“Meyers Leonard’s comment was unforgivable and hurtful and such an offensive term has no place in the NBA or our society,” NBA commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement.
In a video that began circulating on social media on Tuesday, Leonard can be heard saying, “Damn cowards, don’t tell me, damn it, damn it. -.”
On Tuesday night, the Heat had announced that Leonard would be out of the team indefinitely and the center apologized on the Instagram post, writing in part, “I promise to do better and I know my actions futures will be more powerful than my use of that word. “
“He said something that was extremely nasty and hurtful,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said Wednesday. “And we were left with the aftermath of that.”
Silver said Wednesday that Leonard spoke with the Anti-Defamation League, an organization founded to fight anti-Semitism. Leonard’s mandatory cultural diversity program is a multi-session course that offers cultural, racial, and sensitivity training.
“We accept that he is really sorry,” Silver continued in a statement. “In addition, we have informed Meyers that derogatory comments like this will not be tolerated and he is expected to uphold the core values of our league: equality, tolerance, inclusion and respect, at all times in the future.”
Silver, who appeared in ESPN’s Greeny, told presenter Mike Greenberg that Leonard volunteered with the Anti-Defamation League. He also said the $ 50,000 fine was the maximum amount a player could be fined for such an act.
“I agree with his word that he didn’t understand the importance of what he was saying and is paying a price for it,” he said.
The week of suspension does not include the loss of payment for games lost because Leonard is currently injured, sources confirmed to ESPN’s Bobby Marks. He appeared in just three games for the Heat this year and was diagnosed with a shoulder injury that ended the season in January. He will still be compensated for the five games the Heat play during his suspension. If he had been healthy, Leonard would have faced the loss of $ 324,000.
Leonard could become a free agent this summer; the Heat have a team option on him for the season worth about $ 10 million.