Jeff Teague remembered an on-court face-slap incident involving Nemanja Bjelica: " I just slapped him. ... He was so mad. He told me that he would kill me."
Jeff Teague recalled a funny story of how he got away with rookie violence against Nemanja Bjelica.
Nemanja Bjelica
| Team: |
Crvena Zvezda Meridianbet Belgrade |
| Position: | PF |
| Age: | 35 |
| Height: | 209 cm |
| Weight: | 106 kg |
| Birth place: | Belgrade, Serbia |
Teague, an Atlanta Hawks guard at that time, slapped then-Minnesota Timberwolves rookie forward Bjelica in the face and received no call.
"Belly retired this year. Shoutout to Belly. I slapped him in the game. I just slapped him. My fault, Belly. That's my fault. That was some whole s**t right there. I got a turnover, and I just got mad. He was the closest nigga, and I just slapped him," Teague said on a Club 520 Podcast.
"He was so mad. He told me that he would kill me," Teague continued. "Belly, Bjelica, whatever you say his name, shoutout to my guy. I had to play with him in Minnesota, we were teammates [2017-18]. As soon as I walked into the locker room, he was like, 'Hey, I was going to f**k you up, brother. I was going to kill your whole family. Don't do that again.' I looked at him and said, 'Shut the f**k up.' He figured out we were joking all the time, me and him came kind of cool, but he was pissed.
"I slapped him, and I didn't get a tech, nothing," Teague was surprised by the ruling of that incident.
It's easy to understand why Teague was mad at that time -- the Hawks had invested significant effort in a massive 34-point comeback, falling just short of success.
Teague's frustration escalated when Karl Anthony-Towns stopped his layup attempts, and Teague, seeking a foul, engaged with the referee. Interestingly, during this heated interaction, his hand caught Bjelica in the face.
Typically, any facial contact results in a flagrant 2 foul and automatic ejection, but Teague managed to escape such consequences.
