A team full of “Billy Ho’s”???
Via Minnesota Star Tribune
Dante Cunningham noticed when he reported for work in Minnesota this fall that his new Timberwolves team is unlike any for which he has ever played.
“Day One, we were all in the elevator and I kind of looked up,” he said about a crowded ride with many of his new teammates, “and I was just like, ‘Where is everybody?’ “
Everybody, in this case, being black teammates. Come opening night on Friday, Cunningham will be one of five black players on a 15-man Wolves team that has reversed the National Basketball Association’s historical racial percentages with a roster that is the league’s whitest since the Boston Celtics teams of the 1980s.
Raised in Washington, D.C., and educated at Villanova, Cunningham played his first four professional seasons for three different teams in a league where American-born black players constituted 78 percent of roster spots last season and have been at least 75 percent since 1991-92.
Things that make you go “hmmmmmm…”
Twin Cities black leaders have noticed, suggesting the franchise strategically has rolled back the calendar by decades in a league that long has been at the forefront of diversity among America’s professional sports leagues.
“How did we get a roster that resembles the 1955 Lakers?” asked Tyrone Terrell, chairman of St. Paul’s African American leadership council. “I think everything is a strategy. Nothing happens by happenstance.”
That strategy, Terrell and others in the black community believe, is to sell tickets to the Wolves’ fan base, which is overwhelmingly white.
Another black community leader says:
Ron Edwards, a longtime Minneapolis civil rights advocate, said he remembers a day last winter when he was watching the Wolves and the only black player on the floor was Wes Johnson, a situation he calls “somewhat disturbing.” His sentiments grew stronger, he said, as he watched the team’s roster grow even more white this offseason.
“It raises some real questions to me about what’s really intended,” Edwards said. “I think, personally, that it was calculated. Is this an attempt to get fans back in the stands? Minnesota, after all, is a pretty white state.”
Pretty strong accusations, the Timberwolves (obviously) deny that any discrimination has taken place.
“Patently false,” said David Kahn, Wolves president of basketball operations. He and other Timberwolves executives instead call it a coincidence of circumstance and a purposeful plan to scour the globe for the best players they can possibly obtain. They will start the season with players from Russia, Montenegro, Spain and Puerto Rico, a total of five international players among a group that also includes five white American-born players.
Ultimately, the players say they just wants to play with talented guys, regardless of race.
“Obviously, our team is a little unique in [racial makeup], but everybody on our team gets along and everybody on our team can really play,” guard Will Conroy said. “You’ve got a guy like Chase Budinger who can jump out of the gym and then you’ve got Brandon who’s not jumping out of the gym, which is the opposite. Usually you have the black guys jumping out of the gym, but on our team it’s switched around.”
“Honestly, I couldn’t tell you I’ve had more than two or three white guys on a team before,” Cunningham said. “It just happened to get dealt this way. There’s just as many athletic white guys on this team as there are black guys who are athletic. It’s no big deal. We’re here to play ball, so regardless of whether we’re white or black or yellow or purple, we’re going to go out and play.”
What do YOU think? Does it appear that the Timberwolves are trying to limit the “blackness” on their team to appease their mostly-white fanbase??
Hit that comments section and fill it up!
Image via Star Tribune
