The Sacramento Kings’ livestream during their Media day took a controversial turn when reporters were overheard discussing Zach LaVine and Ben Simmons’ physical characteristics and personalities. The players were called things such as ‘hella fine’ and ‘cringe,’ and the controversy has now led to DeMarcus Cousins himself spilling details about another uncomfortable incident that reportedly took place during his rookie year, way back in 2010.

Cousins, who spent seven seasons with the Kings and earned four All-Star selections with the franchise, said the controversy did not surprise him because of what he described as longstanding issues with the media environment surrounding the team, according to a post on the r/nba subreddit.

“I've been one of the main people in the past to talk about how corrupt I felt the media in Sacramento was, how biased, how they do a lot of s*** behind the scenes,” he said.

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The former No. 5 overall pick alleged that coverage of him during his rookie season frequently centered on his physique and conditioning rather than his basketball performance. He claimed former Sacramento Bee columnist Ailene Voisin once lifted his shirt to inspect his body before later writing about it.

“She actually lift my shirt up to see what my body looked like,” he revealed. “I remember in that moment just kind of feeling uneasy about it. I remember speaking about it to the front office at the time and … I got the same answer I got a lot of times as far as dealing with s*** in Sac: ignore it.”

Cousins further argued that the reaction to the hot-mic comments would likely have been different had male reporters made similar remarks about female athletes. It remains to be seen if, and how the Kings respond to the situation, with the latest incident undoubtedly hinting at a pattern, rather than an isolated situation.