Richard Jefferson's description of 'professional' Karl Malone omits a key fact

USA Today

a day ago

In late July, as the NBA ostensibly moves toward marketing its newest generation of stars, possible future face of the league Victor Wembanyama's social media activity indicated that he may want the league to distance itself from Karl Malone.
For those not in the know, Malone allegedly impregnated a 13-year-old child when he was 20, with subsequent blood tests offering a 99.3 percent probability that he was the father. The family of the 13-year-old elected not to press charges.
But the NBA's continued public celebration of the Hall of Fame power forward's basketball accomplishments year over year, despite heinous situations and actions like this hanging overhead, suggests the league lacks reasonable sensitivity.
With Malone recently back in the spotlight because of his birthday last month, it seems someone forgot to pass along this memo to former NBA forward Richard Jefferson, who probably should have avoided giving him his flowers in a recent episode of the Road Trippin' podcast.
While comparing another Hall of Fame power forward, Charles Barkley, Jefferson said he would take Malone over Barkley all-time because of Malone's "level of professionalism." Uh, I have thoughts, but let me gather them up first. You can catch the full context of Jefferson's sentiments at the 50:10 timestamp below.
(Warning: NSFW language is involved in this video.)
Look, it's not great that Barkley may not have taken his training as seriously as he could have throughout his iconic career. Work ethic-wise, he likely left a lot of meat on the bone with the natural talent he possessed.
But any ultimately harmless drinking or partying by Barkley as a player pales in comparison from a professionalism perspective compared to the despicable acts Malone has been accused of at worst, and any other shameless, unethical transgressions at best.
In the mid-1980s, the grandparents of Demetress Bell (the child of the 13-year-old Malone allegedly impregnated) sued Malone for weekly $200 payments in child support. He would instead eventually reach a settlement that didn't require him to acknowledge his paternity of Bell.
A separate incident later occurred with Bonita Ford, Malone's high school girlfriend, who filed a paternity lawsuit against him in 1989 over her twin children. Malone refused to submit DNA blood tests, resolved the case out of court, and only later reached out to both children in 1998 when they were 17-year-old highly-touted basketball recruits.
Outside of any paternity issues, Malone did not seem like a saint as a basketball teammate, either. He was once famously embroiled in a conflict with the late Kobe Bryant and his widow, Vanessa. Per the Los Angeles Times, Malone reportedly made inappropriate passes at Vanessa Bryant during a November 2004 game, even apparently telling the daughter of Mexican immigrants that he was "hunting for little Mexican girls."
After initial back-and-forth, unproductive discussions, Malone would later offer to simply fight Bryant to settle their beef.
Professionalism is not an appropriate description to use if you're going to invoke Malone in this context. Not to mention that it's quite disingenuous in itself to only talk about Malone the basketball player for entertainment purposes, like it's a bog-standard water-cooler conversation about remembering some guys. Because it's not.
Jefferson knows better and needs to do better. Regrettably, he's not alone in this regard.