Slave Owner - Slave Dynamics on Today's Basketball Court?

A recent development with Mike Rice, now former head coach of the Rutgers men’s basketball team, shows footage of Rice beating his players at practices. Here is a clip:

I was shocked when I heard news of a Division I basketball coach (a school moving to the Big Ten next year) beating his players, but knew immediately how relatable it is to my studies in school at this time. I am researching around the question: Why are there more black players and fewer black executives, or positions of importance, in the NBA?

My studies have been anchored behind the book "Forty Million Dollar Slaves" by Bill Rhoden, a black sports columnist for the New York Times (Click here to read further about Rhoden's book). The book talks about blacks struggles in sports throughout history and their failure to collectively cash in on positions of authority.

Rhoden talks about Muhammad Ali and his refusal to join the U.S. Army, risking everything: "When Ali was stripped of his title, it was as if he were being whipped by the overseer" (Rhoden 18). While Ali being stripped of his heavyweight does not relate directly to the players of the Rutgers basketball team, it has relevance. On a basketball court dominated by blacks, these players were being stripped of their dignity by Coach Rice with his actions. Mike Rice is representing the "overseer," physically throwing basketballs and abusing his players.

Rice's actions against his players were completely out of line, and the university did well by firing him. This reflects negatively on white coaches, but especially on the progression of integration in the sports world. If Mike Rice, a white coach, is beating his (predominantly black) players like this in 2013, how far have we really come regarding racial issues and sports in America? An interesting question to consider. Feel free to respond in the comment section below.

March Madness: Who's going to win it all? Oh wait, no one knows.

Mid-March marks one of the most exciting sporting events in the year: the Men's NCAA Basketball Tournament, consisting of a field of college basketball's 68 best teams. Actually, it might not be the sport's 68 best teams, as smaller conferences get one automatic bid which is awarded to the conference tournament champion. However, that just adds to the appeal of the event, with upsets galore.

With the games beginning this Thursday, it made me think just why March Madness is so compelling to America, as well as myself. After reading an article about the tournament by Eddie Pells of the Associated Press, it made me think about the tournament on a larger level of importance. Professor Michael Magazine of the University of Cincinnati sheds some light on why the tournament is so much fun: "'The life lesson is that we make a lot of decisions that are the right decisions, but the outcomes don't always come out the way we planned.'"

What I take from this is that America loves to "make a lot of decisions," and the unpredictability of those decisions adds suspense and entertainment to the games that follow. Magazine's ideas also made me think about how American's like to have the control of making their own decisions, even if the outcomes "don't always come out the way we planned."

The tournament is just a microcosm of the many choices we have to make every day, some decisions more important (who you pick as your champion), and some more obsolete (picking a #1 seed to beat a #16 seed, where a #16 seed has never won a game in tournament history). One can look at the many decisions in this existentialist way, but for the average fan it is just a time of the year to fill out brackets, making you personally invested in every game played. Because as my classmate Jeremy says in his blog post, Americans love to win. We even claim to have never lost a war, when this is probably a false statement. But it is fine that Americans have the drive to win, because no one complains about someone motivated to be the best, even if on the global scale.