Marcus Morris: 'One thing I'm not, is a dirty player'
Marcus Morris was accused of intentionally trying to hurt Luka Doncic, and he made sure to let everyone know that he didn't agree with them.
Before answering any questions from the media, Morris decided to speak at length about Luka Doncic. The majority of his media session was dedicated towards speaking about the subject. For the sake of giving the full transparency of the report, Morris' entire transcript will be presented in this article.
"I'm going to have a broad answer for this. I don't really want to talk about this too much. I just want to have one response, and I just want to leave it at that.
I didn't think it was more of me having to, I just felt as though I should just say something because of how long I've been in this league, the work I've put in to get to the level that I'm at, the people that I feed with being a professional, things like that, that somebody would actually really like try and make a case for me trying to hurt another player intentionally.
Like I said, I stand on respect and morals and hard work. I have my family watching this game, and I approach this game with the utmost respect for every player. I've been in plenty of battles with great players and not once have I ever tried to do anything dirty as far as taking a player out of the game.
To me, in my eyes, we have the best team. I'm grateful to be a part of the Clippers' organization, and I'm grateful to be able to compete against all these guys in the league, and like Luka is a great player for years to come, but to try to disrespect my character, I just felt the need to speak on that.
Like I said, man, I'm a competitor. I love this game, and I play it for certain reasons, but I've never been a guy that tried to take somebody out. I picked him up full court. I've taken the challenge. I've talked to my coaches about taking the challenge. And I honestly didn't even know he had a left ankle injury. I'm worried about my own thing. I have a son coming, I have kids, I have my family.
I just felt like it was too far. I just felt like to try to find a narrative, to try to create a story was too far and I won't take disrespect to my character like that, and I hope he's okay. I actually apologized right when it happened. Mistakes happen, but I'm a man, at the end of the day, with kids and with family watching, and a lot of people have a lot of respect for me, and one thing I'm not is a dirty player and I hang my hat on being a hard worker.
I respect this league and I hope people look at that and know me as who I am, and I would never even go that far of trying to hurt somebody. I just think that's just absurd, and I just think it's just too far."
The biggest takeaways were the fact that Morris vehemently denies ever being a dirty player, and that he personally apologized to Luka Doncic after tripping on him.
While it's very easy to find plays where Morris isn't presented in the most positive light, the incident with Luka Doncic occurred while the Clippers were up 81-52. It's tough to imagine player being so hostile, that they'd deliberately injure another player while up 29 points. An individual like that wouldn't have a place in the NBA.
