Tony Parker won four NBA championships with the San Antonio Spurs alongside Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Gregg Popovich. Parker is a Hall of Famer and one of the defining point guards of the 2000s. There are a million pictures of Parker celebrating after championships, yet ESPN and ABC decided to release a photo that was clearly manipulated with AI during Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals.
ESPN showed this image as it went to commercial. He’s supposed to be Tony Parker, but fans were quick to point out that he doesn’t look anything like him.
What’s so strange about this is this is In a famous photo of Parker, the network simply opted to use AI to enhance his facial features. By doing so, he completely distorted his face and made him look like a completely different person.
Here’s the original image of Parker that ABC/ESPN decided to alter. Was it really worth it to just put a bigger smile on your face?
