Not a Question of Courage:
Anti-Black Racism and the Politics of the NBA Lockout
by David J. Leonard
Following an exhibition game in Philadelphia, Michael Tillery asked the following of Carmelo Anthony:
Michael Tillery: Carmelo I don’t know if anyone asked you this but the fans are wondering why there isn’t such of a…NBA presence…NBA players coming out and speaking on this issue (NBA lockout) publicly like in the NFL…like in other situations.
Carmelo Anthony: “We’re not allowed. We’re not allowed. I mean everybody has their own opinion…you hear people talk here and there…but nobody don’t really come out and say what they really want to say. That’s just the society we live in. Athletes today are scared to make Muhammad Ali type statements.”
Not surprisingly, his comments have led to questions about today’s NBA players, their resolve, their commitment, heart, and courage. For example, one blogger offered the following: “What does Carmelo mean by “we’re not allowed”? Who’s stopping them? Is Carmelo right? Do you think athletes are punks in the modern era as opposed to the way Muhammad Ali stuck his neck out for Vietnam? Maybe these guys should just man up and make changes!” Kelly Dwyerwas similarly dismissive, questioning Anthony’s reference to Ali:
Oh, Carmelo. He's not lying. He's not wrong. But comparing Ali's stand against a conflict in Southeastern Asia that had gone terribly wrong to a discussion over the sharing of actual billions of dollars in Basketball Related Income is the absolute height of absurdity. Yes, athletes today are scared to make Muhammad Ali-type statements (as is the case with most people that want to keep their jobs), but the application of an anecdote like that to a situation like the NBA lockout is completely and utterly wrong.
While folks in the blogosphere used Melo’s comments to incite division and to chastise the union for silencing its members, it would seem that his comments demonstrate the ways that race impacts the lockout while illustrating the potential efforts from the union to manage and mediate the racially based contempt faced by NBA players. As Michael Tillery told me, “The NBA more than any other pro league seems to have an image problem based more on race than anything. You could say the league is more popular when a white player is doing superstar things.” As such, you cannot understand these comments outside a larger of this large racial landscape.
To understand Carmelo Anthony’s comments require a larger context. His comments (and the lockout itself) are very much tied to the larger history of the NBA and race. For example, in wake of the Palace Brawl, the NBA implemented a series of draconian policies that sought to both appease white fans and corporate sponsors who were increasingly uncomfortable with its racial optics, all while disciplining the players to comply and embody a different sort of blackness. According to Michael Tillery, the brilliant commentator, “Since the Brawl and even going back to Kermit Washington's punch of Rudy Tomjonovich, a case could be made that any outspoken player in any regard is influenced to be silenced simply to protect the NBA brand because of an apparent race disconnect.”
The owner’s intransigent position and demands for a hard cap (although at the time of writing the owners appear to have softened on this position, at least at a surface level), major reduction in player access to league revenues, and a myriad of others positions all seem to reflect a sense of leverage. In other words, the owners seem to be trying to capitalize on the contempt and animosity that has long plagued NBA players, a fact worsened by the assault on blackness that followed the Palace Brawl. In a brilliant interview with Michael Tillery, Ron Artest reflects on the public perception and demonization of NBA players that reflects larger racial animus and ideology: “The NBA is not a thug league. There’s a couple of players that grew up similar to rappers who have grown up. What are they going to lynch us for that too? It’s not our fault that we grew up that way. We are talented and smart.”
The lockout represents an attempt to capitalize on the perception of NBA players as thugs, as criminals, as greedy, and undeserving anti-role models. It appears to be an effort to convert the leverage and power that comes from the narrative and ideological assumptions so often linked to black players into greater financial power for the league’s owners.
In thinking about Melo’s comments and the overall reticence of players to speak about the current labor situation leaves me thinking that this is a concerted strategy to combat the advantages that the owners possess (the NBA version of a southern strategy). The union is most certainly trying to correct the public relations difficulties that faced in 1998 (and throughout its history), obstacles that emanate from America’s racial landscape.
During the last NBA lockout, Kenny Anderson, then a point guard with the Boston Celtics, generated quite a bit of backlash when he announced, “'I was thinking about selling one of my cars, I don't need all of them. You know, just get rid of the Mercedes.'' Fulfilling people’s stereotypes about rich and entitled black athletes, Anderson’s comments generated little sympathy from fans, amplifying growing resentment toward the NBA’s primarily black populace. Mike Wise, seemingly mocking, Anderson penned the following:
Two months after the National Basketball Association's lockout came and his paycheck went, Kenny Anderson began contemplating the unthinkable. It had nothing to do with asking his mother in Queens for his old room back or taking a part-time security job; he figured there were only so many indignities young millionaires should have to face.
But with his penchant for buying what he wanted and his accountant having to borrow against his stocks to keep investing, Anderson realized it might be time to do without. Sort of. . . .
Extravagant and expensive tastes have been a hallmark of young millionaire athletes. But without games and paychecks, N.B.A. players are about to learn the frugal side of living large. How long many of them can cope without a biweekly salary may mean the difference in their economic game of chicken with the owners.
Similarly, Patrick Ewing, then union president, described the players’ predicament in the following way: “If you look at people who play professional sports, not a lot of them are financially secure. They make a lot of money, and they also spend a lot of money.” Alonzo Mourning did the unthinkable during the 1998 lockout: he talked about race. “I think there is a perception from the owners to even some fans that we're blacks who should be happy with what we've got, fair or not," he argued. "There's a lack of respect given us in large part because we're athletes. I'm not saying it's all about race because it's not. But it plays a factor." Such statements did not merely turn public opinion to the owners, but did so because the comments were interpreted through dominant white racial frames, undermining player leverage.
So when Alonzo Mourning “inserted” race into the discussion, noting the existence of double standards and how race overdetermined media coverage, fan interpretations, and labor strife itself, the backlash was extensive. The NBA lockout, at one level, was about an increasingly level of fan animus directed toward the league’s primarily black players, much of which reflected the insertion of race into the discussion. At another level, the 1998 lockout was about player divisions. Armen Keteyian, Harvey Araton and Martin Dardis in Money Players, describe the ways in which race, union divisions, and public perceptions impacted the 1998 lockout:
As for the players, Salley said they had let the NBA and the agents divide them into warring factions the public perceived as they haves against the have nots. They came off looking, he said like ‘house Negroes and field Negroes.’
Salley knew enough American history to understand this wasn’t the first something like this had occurred
‘Blacks in this country have always been divided and it never did us any good,’ he said. ‘The NBA is a very black league, so we must be careful of the message we send.’
In effect, Salley’s message was that no matter how successful it became, how big it got, 1970s racial perceptions would never go away for a predominantly black league selling to a white corporate crowd.
Salley, he may have been right, judging by the media’s general response to the summer of labor strife. After at least acknowledging baseball and hockey players had the right to fight for their best deal, many sports journalists more or less rolled their eyes and advised the basketball players to be happy with whatever they got. Stern was help up as the sports shining knight. Jordan, as if he needed the money, was cast as a greedy infidel. One national sports commentator referred on television to Jordan’s involvement as the ‘equivalent of a drive by shooting.’
That even brought out the less polished, 1960s liberal in Stern.
‘Fuck the people who say that Michael was being greedy, that he should just shut up and play,’ Stern said. ‘That’s just code.”
In an effort to avoid the public divisions and to avoid the blowback from a media ready to pounce on any NBA players who inserts race or merely expresses a critical perspective, it seems the players and the union have gone to great lengths to disarm a previous source of leverage for the owners. This is most certainly evident in the relative silence from the players themselves (minus Derek Fisher who most certainly cannot be depicted as a hip-hop baller and part of culture of extravagance, both of which are common narratives attached to the NBA’s black players). It is also evident in the rhetoric seen from players when talking about playing overseas. It is never about the money but instead the love of the game; likewise, the efforts to highlight player participation in summer leagues where the love of the game is on full display, works to undercut the stereotype of the greedy black NBA player that was so prominent to the 1998 NBA lockout.
Carmelo Anthony wasn’t calling players for a lack of courage but rather commenting on the cultural politics of the NBA and the ways in which both the league and its fans demand silence from its player, a fact that reflects new racism at worse. Be visible, play, and even make money but don’t dare speak about injustices, inequalities, or the conditions of labor. In other words, “shut up and play.”
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David J. Leonard is Associate Professor in the Department of Critical Culture, Gender and Race Studies at Washington State University, Pullman. He is the author of Screens Fade to Black: Contemporary African American Cinema and the forthcoming After Artest: Race and the War on Hoop(SUNY Press). Leonard is a regular contributor to NewBlackMan and blogs @ No Tsuris.
