NBA Boycotts: A Way to Send a Message

As Aaron Atayde said, "No one saw this happening."

It's true. Nobody expected the Milwaukee Bucks were willing to forfeit Game Five of their best-of-seven first-round series against the Orlando Magic just to make a stand against social injustices that have been rocking the United States for the longest time. Not only did the Magic refused to accept a forfeit, but the rest of the teams that were supposed to play last August 27 (Manila time) also followed suit in joining the Bucks' boycott which forced the National Basketball Association (NBA) to postpone playoff games for two days. And like everybody else here in the Philippines who woke up that day and were expecting to see NBA games, Jinno Rufino's initial reaction was, "What's going on?"

The "soft strike" that happened in the NBA bubble in Orlando last week was the first topic of last Tuesday's episode of Jump Thru Hoops and Aaron and Jinno tried to make viewers understand what happened and why it happened. To begin with, Giannis Antetokounmpo and company didn't expect the rest of the field to follow suit in protesting against the shooting of Jacob Blake which took place in Wisconsin. The boycott almost led to the 2020 NBA playoffs getting canceled entirely as both Los Angeles teams voted not to continue with the postseason right after that boycott. Fortunately, LeBron James had a change of heart because if not, as Rufino said, "It would have been painful (if the NBA canceled the playoffs)."

The Bucks' boycotting which the other teams and even other teams from other sports leagues worldwide, isn't something that happened for the first time in the history of sports in general. Six decades ago, Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics pulled himself out of a game in which the rest of the Celtics and African-American players from the St. Louis Hawks followed suit in protest against the same thing that the current NBA players are protesting: racial behaviors, particularly against black African-Americans. In a way, the boycott is a way for the NBA players to remind the world that this issue involving social injustices shouldn't be forgotten like other drastic issues that have hit the United States in the past. And if there's one good thing that came out of this boycott, both present, and former NBA and even Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) players are using their celebrity status as a means to get their message across that changes are needed to happen. As Atayde pointed out, "The NBA is one of the most powerful political organizations in the world."

The boycott is about one thing: sending the message across that changes are needed. And this time, the NBA players want to make sure that that message against social injustices isn't going deep down our timelines or at the least-read part of the newspapers. 

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