Brooklyn Nets' Kyrie Irving was dropped by sports giant Nike on Monday after the NBA star sparked a firestorm by posting a link to an anti-Semitic film.
"Kyrie Irving is no longer a Nike athlete," a spokesman for the company told AFP.
The sponsorship deal came under pressure last month when the sportswear giant suspended its relationship with the Nets' point guard.
Hours after the suspension was issued, Irving offered an apology on Instagram. But Nike distanced itself from him, saying it would not launch the Kyrie 8 shoe that had been expected to debut in November.
Irving had been under scrutiny since he wrote a social media post in which he offered a link to the film "Hebrews to Negroes: Wake up Black America" – a 2018 film widely condemned for containing a range of anti-Semitic tropes.
Irving took to Twitter on Monday, replying to a journalist who wrote about the Nike rupture with a GIF of the words "Let the party begin."
Hours later, he also posted: "Anyone who has even spent their hard earned money on anything I have ever released, I consider you FAMILY and we are forever connected. It's time to show how powerful we are as a community."
In the wake of his initial post, Irving was suspended by the Nets, who cited his "failure to disavow anti-Semitism" either on social media or in meetings with reporters.
In an interview, he insisted he was not anti-Semitic.
"I just really want to focus on the hurt that I caused or the impact that I made within the Jewish community, putting some type of threat, or assumed threat, on the Jewish community," Irving told SportsNet New York.
"I just want to apologize deeply for all my actions for the time that it has been since the post was first put up."
