Racism in the NBA and NFL

[Asufiji2004]

NHL.com

[ QUOTE ]
Entry Draft Eligibility
All players age 19 or older [(i) any player who will be age 18 on or before September 15 in the year in which such Entry Draft is held, or (ii) reaches his 19th birthday between September 16 and December 31, both dates included, next following Entry Draft, can attain eligibility by delivering to the League a written notice (Opt in Form) prior to the later of May 1, or seven days following the date such player finishes competing on his team in the year in which such draft is to be held.] are eligible for claim in the Entry Draft, except:
(i) A Player on the Reserve List of a Club, other than as a try-out;
(ii) A player who has been claimed in two prior Entry Drafts;
(iii) A player who previously played in the League and became a free agent pursuant to the Collective Bargaining Agreement;
(iv) A plyer age 21 or older who had played hockey for at least one season in North America when he was age 18, 19 or 20

[/ QUOTE ]

My source is pretty reliable. My point was that the NHL has the same rules and the NHL has mainly white players. So to say the NBA and NFL implement these rules because they players are black is crap! Does the NHL have these rules because they are racist towards white players? It's because they don't want the players to get [censored] up. You can't get [censored] up playing golf you idiot!

[Triumph36]

You didn't read what you pasted.

The NHL entry draft allows 18 year olds. Sidney Crosby is currently 18 years old and playing in the NHL - he was born August 7, 1987.

As for racism, it's not racist - the NBA and NFL are the two leagues without a minor league system. Instituting a policy where players must play in college is better for everyone, save a few incredibly talented atheletes. No one is talking about guys who came out of high school, declared themselves eligible for the draft, didn't get selected, and are now playing in Serbia. As for the NFL, this is just common sense - no one should be coming out of high school to play in the NFL. Now you can argue that this is to prop up the NCAA in both leagues, seeing as how they now serve essentially as minor leagues - fine. But all sports should have a minor league system - most atheletes are not ready to compete at the highest level at 18.

[Pudge714]

While McGrady Lebron KG have been successes you are ignoring the failures. The Lenny Cooke's Deangelo Collins, Leon Smith's of the world. If T-Mac Bron or KG goes to college they probably still go into the pros make millions, however if Lenny Cooke was forced to go to college he would probably much better off. You only point out the people who benefit from this policy, not the people who suffer.

[Jorge10]

I dont know if its racism, I think its more closely related to good business pratice. I mean the owners and to a lesser extent the fans were getting screwed by players coming out of high school and being mediocre.

I mean most of the high school players that went straight to the NBA were terrible, except for a few. Most of the kids that came out of high school were either traded or developed when their contract was going to end or just ended with the team that drafted them. Its not really fair for the team to get nothing for their money.

Theres a reason the Oakland A's dont draft from high school. If you read moneyball you will have read how the A's GM thinks drafting high school kids is one of the stupidest things you can do as an organization. He believes this because he says the high school kids dont know where they are going with their lives yet, they might like baseball they might not, one cant be sure.

[Triumph36]

You meant to reply to the OP, I think.

But Lenny Cooke, who played his senior year 30 minutes from my hometown, is exactly who I was thinking of.

[holeplug]

Bill Simmons and Ralph Wiley had a good debate about race and the NBA a year or so ago. And apparently you can't access his old articles for free anymore so I can't go dig it up [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img].

Is it just me, or whenever someone cries "Racist!" do yuo think that person is a racist? I mean, you're making a generalization about white people making generalizations about black people. And it's not even actual generalizations either. You're interpreting a rule that you perceive to be racist simply because it affects a larger number of blacks that whites. And for that matter, percentage wise, there are more blacks in the NBA and NFL than whites, so yes, obviously it will affect more blacks than whites. And just for the hell of it, let's pretend that your assumptions are correct and that there are a bunch of Klansman running these two sports dominated by black athletes. Is two years of college ball actually going to hurt a player's chances of making it in the big league, aside from an injury? Frankly, I think it helps to weed out some of the disappointments and gives a tiny sliver of respectablity back to the NBA.

[Victor]

im not sure if the leagues and these rules are racist. they are clearly trying to make the league more "marketable" and "clean."

regardless, i think its fundamentally wrong to not allow 18 yr olds (and younger) to undertake a career. something about some amendment about the pursuit of happiness.

[Clarkmeister]

I think the NFL policy is a very sound one, it's been around forever, and it makes sense.

The NBA dress code is simple. The players keep talking about how it's a business. How they are business men. Well, if you are a part of the business world, part of that includes looking a certain part in order to satisfy those who are paying your bills. You can't have it both ways. Obviously since the league's predominantly black, it could be perceived as racist, but it affects Jason Williams as much as Jay Williams. The demand that athletes dress professionally with pride is not a new one, it's just the first time that it's really needed to be enforced. And it's not like the NBA dress code is particularly strenuous.

As for the draft, that was 100% a business decision. Too many teams were tying up valuable cap space and roster spots on players they needed to teach how to play. It was costing teams money. The need for the age minimum is on the surface totally bogus (no one whines when 14 year old white girls play tennis for $) but from the league's perspective, it's a decision made to protect their teams. If the new D-League works out, the NBA may very well reverse course when the CBA comes up again. But until then, they just don't want people shelling out cash and roster spots to Darko Milicic.

[gonores]

Your argument is a flat-out bad argument.

What's the difference between basketball/football and other sports?

Two words.

Owner Risk.

Even better....one word.

Speculation

Only in football and basketball is there a massive element of speculation risk.

Alex Smith #1/#1 in football: 6 years, $57 mil
Andrew Bogut #1/#1 in basketball: 5 years, $26 mil (and that money is guaranteed)
Justin Upton #1/#1 in baseball: ~$5mil

Football teams that are drafting #1 overall usually clock in around $500-600 million in franchise value. Do you know what happens to a $500 million franchise after a few $50 million investments go wrong?

It's even scarier for the NBA, with poor teams clocking in around the $150 million mark. The Bucks had to outlay a sixth of their value on Bogut this year.... in guaranteed money.

Compare that to the $5 million laid out by Arizona (worth $286 mil) to Upton or the $3 million max contract for rookies in the NHL ($110-$170 million franchise value for poorer-performing teams), and you start to get a glimpse of the economics involved with major pro sports. Baseball and hockey have a well-developed farm system to improve young talent. Even though baseball players can go "pro" at age 17, when was the last time you saw an 17 or 18 year-old on a major league diamond?

As far as other sports, I shouldn't have to really expound on my argument too deeply. If Michelle Wie fall apart on tour, she doesn't get paid. She's not taking away cap space from better-performing teammates. She's not a risk to anyone but herself. Ditto for Suzie Q. TennisPlayer or John H. BilliardsPlayer.

And is it really that bad of a gig for a 18 year-old aspiring football or basketball player? Telling them to go spend two years getting an education and being big man on campus while the owners accumulate a little more film and info on the player before investing a huge chunk of equity on these players? Are owners really "keeping blackie down" by telling them to wait a year or two before making 8-digits?

In a perfect world, a professional draft would work like this: #1 overall pans out as the best player available in that year's draft. #2 pans as second best player in the draft, and so on. It's not that owners want to keep blackie down. It's that they want to pay players what they are worth. Off the top of my head, a good example might be the 2001 NBA draft. 19yo high-schooler Kwame Brown goes #1 and busts. 19yo Tony Parker goes #28 overall and earns jack squat. Another year or two of development for these players, and suddenly Parker isn't earning less than $1mil a year while Kwame makes more than $4mil a year.

Are we to fault players for trying to cash in while they can...before everyone discovers they go bust or before they suffer a career-ending injury? Of course not. But just like in all business, money is power. The owners get to call the shots, and owners are all about mitigating risk.

(Ready for my cheesy closing line?)

You're screaming black and white, but all owners care about is green. Owners might have a problem with paying first-overall money to a poor black kid named Kwame Brown, but they'd have no problem paying the same kind of money to a poor black kid named Lebron James. There's too much at risk in the world of pro sports to be a racist owner.