Grizzlies' Fizdale: 'Delusional' to defend Trump's Charlottesville remarks

Following the racially charged incidents that occurred in Charlottesville, Va., on Saturday, President Donald Trump issued a controversial statement in which he blamed the violence "on many sides" instead of singling out the white supremacists and neo-Nazis involved.

Memphis Grizzlies head coach David Fizdale discussed the events with MLK50's Wendi C. Thomas, and expressed disdain for Trump's response and his defenders, even calling them "delusional in the mind":

It’s disgusting (to equate the Nazi marchers with Black Lives Matter protesters). What are you talking about here? How can you even say that? You watch those people march up the street with their little - they’re so ridiculous looking with their tiki torches; they’ve actually got tiki torches; that says enough - but you see them marching up the street and what’s coming out of their mouths, and you tell me that they’re just there quietly protesting? And you’re telling me that there were some good people in that crowd?

You can’t say that. If you’re standing next to these people with a torch, and whether your mouth is closed or open, if they’re saying that, on the way to that march, and they’re saying that, you get out of that line. You get as far away from that line as possible. So the fact that they were in unison, marching, saying all of these things, you can’t tell me there’s a good person in there. And for (President Trump) to put those protesters that were there to stop them in the same boat as those awful, evil people that are there to just wreak havoc on that beautiful city, I’ve been to that city; Charlottesville is an awesome city.”

“If you put a Muslim in that car (that killed a protester opposing the white supremacists), what are you calling that person, right? You’re a terrorist. For this to happen and for our president to put that on the same level as people trying to fight hate and bigotry, peacefully, and standing up for their country and their city and saying this is not acceptable here, when our country went to war, and millions of people died from that war, and now you’re letting it happen on our streets? You can’t put that on the same level. For anyone who can sit there and defend his comments? You’re either stupid, honestly, you’re either just stupid or you’re sick. That’s how I’m looking at it. Sick, I mean you’re totally delusional in the mind. You’re totally like, there is something going on internally with you that’s not right. Because there’s no way you can listen to those comments, agree with what he said, and do it with a common sense logic. I’m sorry, there’s just no way I can see you saying that.

Fizdale also expressed his desire to see the city of Memphis remove statues of Nathan Bedford Forrest (lieutenant general in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War) and Jefferson Davis (president of confederate states from 1861-65).

"For that to sit out there in the wide open in our city, I think, is a disgrace," he added.