In general, I just can't get onboard with the whole 'NBA' thing. The product seems to be too clean, to well produced and too slick for me to enjoy. Plus, they play in quarters not halves and seem to be intent on trying to push this whole weird idea about basketball jerseys with sleeves that really needs to stop and go away.
Yet despite that, the NBA was starting to intrigue me a little of late. Where once, you could seemingly count on the Lakers or Celtics or even the Bulls back in the day to dominate everything, the world seemed to turn upside down and Golden State was suddenly good. Denver was good. Tim Duncan, who seems to have been playing in the NBA since I was in high school was still doin' his thing with the Spurs in San Antonio. King James and Company weren't immortal, as their loss to of all teams, Dallas proved a couple of years ago. Brooklyn got a team again and yes, suddenly, apropos of nothing- well, apart from a Chris Paul trade and the acquisition of Blake Griffin, the Clippers were relevant and even good again.
I'm not saying this made me want to sit down and convert into a diehard NBA fan, but it certainly made me pay more attention to it than I had been in years past. (Which meant more than 'no attention whatsoever.')
Then Donald Sterling happened.
I'm not even that pissed (well, I'm pissed, obviously- but not that pissed) about what he said on the tape. It seems like a pretty ham-fisted attempt by his girlfriend, mistress or whatever she is to set him up and make some cash from TMZ and what you hear on the tape is the sort of icky, non-overt, dancing around what he really wants to say, type of racism that makes you want to take a shower and not associate with people like that ever again. Is it racist? Oh my yes. Is it disgusting? You betcha. But is it what I'm pissed about? No.
What I'm pissed about and what everybody should be pissed about is that Sterling has been a racist asshat for decades now and the NBA has known this and not done a damn thing. You think the tape was bad? Wait until you read about his exploits as a super-duper-racist slumlord who actually did oppress poor minorities, just because he could! As far back as 2006 (if not further) people have been saying 'hey, this guy is a racist asshat- and it's disgusting that he gets to own a team in this league.' And you know what the NBA has done? Nothing.
That's right. Nothing. They haven't had to do anything- despite the fact that the a large portion of the NBA's business comes from minority communities like African-Americans The Clippers were totally irrelevant. They sucked. They sucked a lot. Sterling and his views could be swept under the rug and quietly ignored because they could. It didn't matter. No one apart from Billy Crystal gave a shit about the Clippers so who cared? It's not like they were going to make the playoffs and maybe win the NBA Title anytime soon, right?
Ooops- and that, right there is what really pisses me off about all of this. It's okay in the NBA to be a racist shitbag billionaire owner, as long as your team sucks out loud. But if you can post pretty good odds of potentially winning it all and getting your hands on the trophy on national television? Well, we can't be having that, now can we?
It's not clear what exactly the NBA can do to Sterling- supposedly there's a super-secret Article 35 that could be invoked to force him to sell the franchise (probably a notion worth considering) and I don't know much about franchising laws and how that works, but the notion occurs to me if the NBA extends someone a franchise, surely they can take that franchise away.
We'll see what new Commish Adam Silver can rustle up. Because right now, to me, the issue isn't some old rich racist asshat, it's "in this league, you can be as racist as you want provided your team sucks and nobody notices." That's not something anyone should find acceptable.
The ball is in their court.
UPDATED: Well, that was decisive. And ESPN's Bomani Jones completely dominated this controversy in a ten minute segment that everyone should sit down and listen too.
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