Things Are Different Now, For Real

This special, mid-week Schloss-Blog cannot be held for the weekend.

The Milwaukee Bucks voiced their protest by not showing up for their game in the bubble, a protest of the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, a Wisconsin town with a lot of Bucks fans.

Then the NBA canceled the rest of its games that night.

Then the WNBA.

And MLS. And some MLB.

Some baseball players said they didn't have enough time to discuss doing the same.

Hockey too.

I looked at all this and realized how lucky I am and how legitimate all these athletes are in their protest voices, their boycotts and their frustration.

When I go out and drive around, run errands or am on my way out to dinner or a game to cover, I am not worried that a police officer will pull me over.

Because I'm white.

But all these athletes are saying they are worried, for themselves, that they've lived through it, that they often tool around in fear.

They're worried for their kids, especially when they reach driving age.

I never had to worry about that with my daughter. No one in my family ever had to worry about that with their kids.

No one.

But black athletes do. Blacks do.

Now, with these protests, I see for real the legitimacy of their concerns and those of the entire black community. I was always aware of it, but now I'm not just seeing it, I'm feeling it.

I attended segregated public schools growing up in Brooklyn. My friends and I would ride out to Lost Battalion Hall just to play pickup games and test our skills with some of the best schoolyard players in Nu Yawk in the facility where our beloved Knicks practice at in those days. 

And then I attended the same environment in college.

And taught for 23 years at a college famous for its diversity of student body. And covered and wrote about athletes of color and still do.

Meanwhile, idiot Clay Travis is exploiting this racial element to rant about how stupid the athletes are in their protests, that they're proverbially shooting themselves in their feet.

The next time he has a black athlete on his show will likely be the first time.

This whole thing - George Floyd, LaQuan McDonald, Breonna Taylor and now Jacob Blake - makes it all too real, even for someone like me, who, like I said, grew up in and attended schools in mixed environments all the way through my education and into my professional life.

I'm listening to athletes, retired and otherwise, say, "I'm tired of being tired," which Jay Williams of ESPN just said on air.

I'm listening to athletes, like the most-high profile of them all, LeBron James, and respected coaches, like Doc Rivers, who I actually saw play when he was in high school, speak out in frustration that the white community does not understand the fear that blacks live in.

I wouldn't blame the NBA for not finishing its season. I might blame them if they do.

It's time for a change. But I've heard that before.

One more thing: to watch the Republican National Convention this week, you'd never know any of this is going on and when they do decide to recognize it, it will be to quiet and shame the protesters and not to address what they are protesting. And it will be to shame the athletes in their protests.

Which is exactly the point - the White House, the president, the First Lady, the Republican Party have no shame.

Not such a good night, is it, Mrs. Calabash? Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?