Nick Saban To Lebron James After Barber Shop Show Complaint: "I've Never Heard Of Your Show. We're Gonna Keep Doing It."
ESPN – Alabama coach Nick Saban said Tuesday that he doesn’t plan to scrap a program that drew a complaint earlier this week from LeBron James and his media platform Uninterrupted.
It started last week, when Alabama released a trailer on Twitter for “Shop Talk” showing Saban and Atlanta Falcons receiver Julio Jones — who played college ball for the Crimson Tide coach — in a barbershop setting.
LeBron James’ multimedia platform UNINTERRUPTED has sent a letter to the University of Alabama addressing concerns over copyright infringement and intellectual property appropriation after Tide football released a trailer for “Shop Talk.”
On Monday, Uninterrupted sent a letter to Alabama, citing concerns over copyright infringement, trademark rights and intellectual property. Those concerns stemmed from a show the platform aired last year called “The Shop,” where James, Golden State forward Draymond Green and others talk in a barbershop. A second episode followed in March in which James spoke about his infrequent driving habits, and the filming of content for a third has been completed.
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“Your continued exploitation of ‘Shop Talk’ infringes ‘UNINTERRUPTED’s’ copyright, trademark rights and other valuable intellectual property rights in ‘The Shop’ and significantly damages ‘UNINTERRUPTED’s’ commercial prospects for ‘The Shop, ” according to the letter sent to Alabama.
However, none of James’ businesses have a copyright or trademark associated with “The Shop,” which would make this an intellectual property claim.
Speaking Tuesday, Saban said he didn’t know about James’ show.
“I think LeBron James is a great player,” the coach said. “There’s been at least 20 barbershop-type things I’ve seen. I didn’t even know he had one. I’m sorry anybody could be offended by something we were just trying to have fun with. I enjoyed it and we’re going to continue to do it.”
I think Lebron is one of the best basketball players of all time and a great father and an incredibly generous and impactful member of his community. I also think Lebron is suchhhhh a whiiinnnnyyyyy biiiiitcccchhhhboy sometimes. I mean what are we talking about here? A “barbershop show with people talking to each other”? Seriously? That’s intellectual property? People talking inside of a barbershop? Buddy, hate to break it to you, but you stole that idea too. The movie is literally fucking called Barbershop. Or maybe I can refer you to Barbershop 2: Back In Business. If you haven’t caught that either, try Barbershop: The Next Cut. Spoiler alert – they revolve around a barbershop.
Normally I’d just assume these are Uninterrupted’s lawyers sending this shit out. This is what lawyers live for. They just spend all day sending C & D’s all over the place and seeing who plays along. But Lebron made his own comment about it!
James responded to Saban’s rebuttal following the Cavaliers’ 112-106 win over the Raptors on Tuesday night.
“I mean, I think you guys know Nick Saban more than me from a media perspective,” he said. “You guys know Nick Saban more than I do, so that’s exactly what I would think he would say. I built Uninterrupted for a reason and for us athletes to have a platform to be able to speak about whatever we want to talk about. I respect him as a coach, but I’ll be damned if I’ll allow someone to use our platform or try to do the same thing we’re doing and just think it’s OK.
“So, the lawyers will figure it out.”
After a game! My dude just played an NBA basketball game and talked about Nick Saban’s internet show in his postgame interviews. Talk about real estate.
I’m sure Bron and his team push around people like this all the time, all the little guys and mom and pop production companies just trying to get their content out there and getting sued into oblivion for having like, a basketball in the back right corner of the frame, or a lead actor with a receding hairline. Well they finally ran into a guy that’s not gonna get steamrolled over. Oh no no no. Not Nick Saban. Nick Saban will be talking to his buddies while getting a fresh cut and a straight razor shave until Alabama’s lawyers literally beat him over the head with that swirly pole and drag him out of the place.