Jahlil Okafor tweets apology for recent incidents

Philadelphia 76ers rookie Jahlil Okafor apologized for his recent behavior on Sunday evening

Philadelphia 76ers rookie center Jahlil Okafor has been one of the most impressive players of the 2015 NBA Draft class through the first month of the season. His offensive ability is undeniable and the potential for him to be a star in this league is clearly there. It’s been his recent actions off of the court that have been troublesome.

News broke on Sunday that the 19-year-old big man was pulled over and cited for going 108 mph on the Ben Franklin Bridge three weeks ago and was cited for reckless driving. That report came at the end of a week where video surfaced of Okafor getting into a physical altercation in the streets of Boston and a week where reports came out that the big man had a gun pointed at him outside of a club in Philadelphia after a verbal altercation with a heckler back in October.

In the light of all of this, the rookie’s image took big hit after big hit this week. On Sunday evening, the 19-year-old Okafor took to Twitter to express his apologies:

After his apology, Okafor offered words of assurance that this type of thing wasn’t going to become the norm for him:

While athletes apologizing on social media and not choosing to issue a public, verbal apology is a problem of the era that we live in, you have to appreciate Okafor’s apparent sincerity and willingness to own up to his mistakes. He comes across as a guy fresh out of one year at college who made stupid mistakes and will accept the consequences of his actions so that he can move forward. That’s about all you can ask.

Now the key will be for Okafor to live up to his words and keep his nose clean going forward.