Danny Ferry Reportedly Said Luol Deng "Has a little African in him" and Implied He's Two-Faced

Danny Ferry, the Atlanta Hawks’ general manager, made comments about Luol Deng that began the internal probe which led to the discovery of the racially offensive email from majority owner Bruce Levenson and his placing his interest up for sale. Earlier Monday, Yahoo’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported on what Ferry said to incur the probe:

WSB-TV’s Zach Klein obtained a letter allegedly sent in June from Hawks minority owner Michael Gearon to Levenson demanding Ferry’s ouster, which included an expansion of the GM’s quote:

The full text of Gearon’s letter can be read here; it does not specify whether Ferry was reading verbatim from a scouting report or voicing his own opinions. The letter cites fear in a post-Donald Sterling environment of ownership getting caught up in a tempest if Ferry’s remarks ever became public (this would prove to be prophetic, obviously), and that the team’s management became less racially diverse after Ferry became general manager.