Kendrick Perkins admits he would have fought Giannis if he slapped him like he slapped his Greek teammate: "We got to get our feet hot"

All has been quiet on Giannis Antetokounmpo‘s front despite the persistent rumors surrounding his future with the Milwaukee Bucks. However, the two-time NBA MVP made headlines earlier this week when footage of him slapping the back of the head of his teammate on the Greek national men’s basketball squad, Giannoulis Larentzakis, emerged on social media platforms.

Former NBA champion and now popular talking head, Kendrick Perkins, addressed the incident on the “Road Trippin'” podcast, claiming that had Antetokounmpo done that to him, there would have been hell to pay.

Retaliation would have been in order

Perkins spent his entire 14-year career as the designated enforcer on any of the four teams he played for. Tasked with defending any of his teammates, he built a career out of doing the dirty work. From setting hard screens to taking up for any of his comrades in the event of a scuffle, he was more than willing to do what it took to protect his team.

So, it’s safe to say that had Antetokounmpo hit Perkins on the back of his head, he wouldn’t merely stand by and do nothing.

“Giannis got me f—ked up. He would have had me f—ked up. We would have got our feet hot. Straight up. Win, lose, or draw. There’s no way you go slap me in the back of the head. That wasn’t — that ain’t playing,” Perkins said.

“Did you see Giannis’ facial expression? You know, you get to biting your bottom lip and you put that much force behind it, man, you got me f—ked up, bro. We got to get our feet hot. I don’t give a damn what the circumstances are. As a man, as anybody, you got me so bent out of shape, bro,” the retired big man added.

Frye’s take on Giannis’ slap

The show’s co-host, former NBA veteran Channing Frye, also chimed in, saying it behooved him to think about what caused Giannis to land such a blow to his teammate.

“I just have not seen somebody get smacked like that since… Hey, you know, you be loud at church and your grandma just gonna look, be like, ‘Lord…’ Like, oh, I don’t know what would warrant that. Like, what?” Frye said.

Additional reports, though, shed more light on the matter, saying that this sort of thing is nothing new between Larentzakis and Antetokounmpo, especially since they grew up together and have been playing for the Greek national team since 2013.

Frye, though, noted that like Perkins, he wouldn’t let things of this nature go without a conversation, or, at the very least, an apology.

“Let’s say, he did hit me like that and he didn’t immediately go, ‘You know what, my bad,’ like and apologize — I’m going to be mad,” he saud. “I might have to tackle him, or I might punch him in the stomach, but it’s over because he’s apologizing.”

“Giannis bit his lip, looked at him, slapped him like a dog in the wrong room, and then went back to doing what he was doing,” Frye continued. “That’s the part that makes me — obviously, the slap one — but the fact that he didn’t even look at him like, ‘Oo, I kind of got you.'”

Since Antetokounmpo, his teammate, or anyone from the team, for that matter, spoke up about that incident, it can only be assumed that, as hard as the slap was, it was nothing but playful banter between two lifelong teammates.

This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Aug 22, 2025, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

Kendrick Perkins admits he would have fought Giannis if he slapped him like he slapped his Greek teammate: “We got to get our feet hot”

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