So, we all know Steven A Smith has been allowed to say whatever for years. Accusing team owners of being racist and whatnot. Then of course we had the players comparing team owners to slavery. Recently Skip has been accused of racism as well and now we have the wonderful, enlightened, well read and knowledgeable Kendrick Perkins spark up the race debate regarding Jokic. So what are your thoughts about this? Are they trying to stir up something and if so, why? It's clear Perkins, just like 90% of people on ESPN doing sports coverage, that he's a puppet. But I wonder what's the angle here? What are they trying to do? Appeal to some demographic by keep highlighting racism in sports and the world? Or is this freedom of speech gone wrong, as in spreading lies that are toxic and potentially dangerous? I personally hate it and most of the race related comments made by these fools are unfounded, at best just the opinion of sad individuals and at worst something pushed for by the show, channel or even the owners (Disney). Controversy sells and is perfect for clickbait, so I really wonder what's going on here. I have no insight beyond the obvious that any debate is usually just guys forced to pick a side and screaming loudly, saying something dumb and whatnot is a part of that. But this is starting to feel like a combination of agenda pushing (wokeness perhaps?) for clicks and rich dummies who feel they are so important that people should care about their opinions on bigger issues than basketball, which we don't because they come across as quite uninformed. So what is up and how you feel about this?
This has got to be a joke. Being racist towards white people is not only rampant but it is being taught. More and more people are calling all white people derogatory names talking about how they are trash and should all die. People who are white today have nothing to do with what was done 100 years ago or more but they are bringing up the past and spitting on people now like they are responsible for something that they not only didn't do but CANT do because it's freaking illegal like own slaves. It's sad when your nations enemies propoganda is working to divide your country into a thousand pieces so they can mow you down when they have you fighting each other blindly.
No, teaching kids in schools to be racist to white people is not “everywhere”. Again, that’s nonsense.
(Former) team owners who have demonstrated racist views (like Donald Sterling) and this Perkins comment are two different things. The former is, in the cases I recall, well documented and corroborated, and there are plenty of public incidents. The Perkins comment that you pointed out (which context I’m not familiar with) sounds stupid, but I’d just disregard it. You don’t have to get riled up at some random thing you see on Twitter—the “media” is not a big conspiracy.
I see some people need to go and read and understand what racism is.... What Perkins said may be misguided or ignorant to a point, but in no way is it racist. And racism is not being taught against the people that made it popular and legal at a point in time......
Magic Johnson won back to back MVP's and was not top 10 in scoring in the very late 1980's. Dirk Nowtzki was in the top 10 in scoring the year he won the MVP, if I remember right. As far as the larger perspective, the NBA has named a number of men MVP when they didn't deserve it....... Rose beat out LBJ, Westbrook and Curry stole a couple of MVP's from Harden.... Kobe didn't deserve it the year he won it.
Never forget at the height of the George Floyd movement, to which the NBA was front and center, words like "END RACISM" and "EQUALITY" printed all over the floor....Montrez Harrell calls Luka a "b**** ass white boy!"
I wouldn't put this on ESPN so much as I would say this is just Perk voicing a thought that he and others have had. I don't think Perk is making a good point, and his parameters are chosen specifically to further his point (>1990, <Top 10 scoring) instead of using some statistically meaningful cutoff points. But this is a topic he cares about. He put a book out recently that's almost half about race, so I'm not surprised if it's top of mind for him. All 3 guys are very different players. Nash and Jokic are largely bolstered by making assists rather than scoring, so it makes sense they weren't top 10 in scoring. As for Dirk, I'm actually surprised he wasn't in the top 10, but I would guess he was close. Plus, iirc, the Mavs were the best regular season team that year. It's not uncommon for "Best Player on Best Team" to win. So there are logical explanations that make more sense than "NBA is racist." Lastly, the one thing all 3 guys have in common is that they aren't American. There is clearly an anti-American bias in the NBA. Ok I looked up the Dirk scoring. Both he and T-Mac averaged 24.6 ppg to rank 10 and 11 when sorting by ppg. But Dirk was 5th in total points scored that season, which is probably more relevant than ppg. So I'm going to go ahead and say Perk was just factually wrong.
It’s more of a favoritism thing nowadays. But it should be the best player on the best team. Point blank.
You aren't wrong, but if somebody tried to make a similar case as to why some black players in a sport only won awards because they were black, people wouldn't be shrugging and saying so what. There would be an uproar. I don't really want to go there, but there's a lot of accepted "OK for me but not for thee" with the leagues black players regarding race or other social status. Players have made openly homophobic or antisemetic comments, and the players support them, or at the very least refuse to call them on it. When the comments are directed towards a black person then they wanna have zero tolerance on bigotry.
Disagreed with this. Phoenix had the best overall record in 2022 - should the MVP have been Booker? Utah had the best overall record in 2021 - should the MVP have been Gobert? Mitchell? Who was the best player on the Spurs team that finished with the best record in 2014? Duncan? Kawhi? Parker? No one averaged more than 17 ppg. No one averaged double digit rebounding nor assists. The best player isn't always on the best team. Just like the best regular season team doesn't always win the championship.
