Basketball Hall of Famer John Stockton, the NBA’s all-time assists leader, didn’t score points with fans for appearing in an anti-vaccine documentary.
In a clip from the series “Covid and the Vaccine: Truth, Lies and Misconceptions Revealed” making the rounds on social media Thursday, the former Utah Jazz guard brags about his supposed expertise on the coronavirus pandemic.
“This isn’t a virus cheating us of this opportunity,” he says of COVID-19. “It’s the guys making decisions saying, ‘No, no we’re too scared. We’re going to shut everything down. Sit in your house and be careful.’ My kids and my grandkids hearing these things and accepting them as truth when I know by my significant amount of research that it isn’t, it’s very frustrating.”
CBS affiliate KREM reported that Stockton, 59, also mentioned Golden State Warriors star Steph Curry in a quote that appears on the trailer’s website: “One of the things that sticks in my head is losing someone like Steph Curry to basketball would be a crime. I just think what a disappointment to this world it would be if that guy didn’t become who he is. So I wonder who we are missing out on right now.” The comment about Curry is presented without context on the site, but Stockton may have been addressing shutdowns limiting sports activities.
The trailer, posted in January, is set to dramatic music and features a parade of fear-mongering sources casting doubt on COVID-19 vaccines. One even asserts that the pandemic was “made up.”
Stockton’s appearance earned jeers and jokes on Twitter: