John Stockton, the former Utah Jazz player and one of Gonzaga University’s basketball team’s most famous alumni, has lost his season tickets to home games after a disagreement with the university’s athletics department over its mask mandate. “Basically, it came down to, they were asking me to wear a mask to the games and being a public figure, someone a little bit more visible, I stuck out in the crowd a little bit,” Stockton said. “And therefore they received complaints and felt like from whatever the higher-ups—those weren’t discussed, but from whatever it was higher up – they were going to have to either ask me to wear a mask or they were going to suspend my tickets.” Stockton has taken a very public stance against pandemic safety measures and has spread extensive misinformation around the COVID-19 virus, including the bogus claims that possibly millions of people have died from vaccines, including more than 100 professional athletes. He is one of two players for whom Gonzaga has retired jersey numbers and he remains the NBA’s all-time leader in assists and steals.
