New video confirms sheriff’s deputy instigated altercation with Masai Ujiri

Newly released security camera footage confirms that the sheriff’s deputy instigated the physical altercation with Masai Ujiri after Game 6 of last year’s NBA Finals.

It was an ugly incident marring what should otherwise have been an evening of pure joy. As the Toronto Raptors began celebrating their Game 6 win and NBA Championship on the Warriors’ homecourt, Raptors GM Masai Ujiri was involved in a physical altercation with a sheriff’s deputy as he tried to join his team on the court.

There was no clear video of the entire incident and witnesses mostly corroborated Ujiri’s story that the deputy instigated the incident. However, the deputy, Alan Strickland, filed a lawsuit against Ujiri, the Raptors and their parent company, saying, “Ujiri shoved him so hard on the court that he suffered physical injuries to his head, jaw, chin and teeth.”

The lawsuit is still pending but today, video was released as part of the legal proceedings that showed the incident in much greater detail.

What does the newly released video of the Masai Ujiri altercation show?

This first view comes from an elevated angle and appears to show the police officer delivering at least two dramatic two-handed shoves before Ujiri pushes back.

This second angle comes from the officer’s body camera and shows the same thing, with the angle emphasizing just how aggressively the officer was shoving him.

The video seems to confirm that Strickland was the first to create physical contact and with much greater force than the later shove from Ujiri. It takes some serious mental gymnastics to see Ujiri’s actions as anything but defensive considering the sequence of events. I won’t presume to guess at Strickland’s motivations here but I will say that the optics of a white police officer getting physical with a Black NBA employee seem both poignant and painful in the middle of the league’s ongoing advocacy for racial justice.