SPORTS REPORTERS ARE FULL OF IT

All of these sports reporters need to stop with the BS indignation over Kevin Durant leaving the OKC Thunder for the Golden State Warriors.

All NBA cities are not created equal, especially for the appeal it may hold for wealthy men of color. With all due respect to Oklahoma City, (a city that I have actually never visited, though I have spent a significant amount of time in the smaller Tulsa), it does not hold the same appeal for multi-million dollars African American professional athletes as some of the leagues other cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, New Orleans and of course the Bay Area. Cleveland, even with LeBron there for 9 collective years, has never been able to attract a marque free agent to come to the team to play. Kevin Love acquired via trade and Kyrie via the draft…name one…I’ll wait.

Nearly every one I knew, that has had a chance to visit, lists San Francisco as one of their favorite cities. The high cost of living is probably at the heart of why more people do not relocate to the bay area unless accompanied by a high paying job offer. That clearly was not an issue for Kevin Durant.

I am tired of all the theatrics and indignation that the Stephen A. Smith’s of the world display over players exerting the hard fought right of actually choosing whom they would like to play for via free agency. The NBA, MLB and even the NHL are the only major sports leagues that have collective bargaining systems in place that allow for true freedom of movement and choice for players once their existing contracts have expired.

This level of free agency, far different than the much more restrictive system employed in the NFL, came only after several work stoppages, both player strikes and owner lockouts, that changed the nature and freedom of player movement and questions of loyalty versus playing for money.

I am a Knick fan for many years, but my allegiance to the name on the front of the jersey does not prohibit me from seeing the fairness and circumstances faced by the players, even when it may necessarily benefit my team. Team owners have shown, with the likes of the rant in 2010 by Cleveland Cavs owner Dan Gilbert against LeBron choosing to leave the Cavs at the time, how disconnected to the notion of “Free Agency” they are and that the players were not literally “owned” by them.

It was not always that way in sports. The players had little rights in negotiating higher wages because in large part there were no other alternatives to being able to leave their teams. Once free agency was implemented, it was first done in a manner that still gave teams matching rights (see the NFL) and salary cap measures kept player movement down. Today while the NBA still has incentives in place that allow for a player’s present team to offer more money than a new team, the freedom to move is no longer a barrier to choice.

The average length of an NBA career is 4.8 years (5.6 MLB, 5.5 NHL and 3.5 NFL). Superstar athletes like Durant are usually considered to have much longer careers (12 plus years barring injuries), but relative to a person’s lifetime their athletic playing careers are relatively short. So shouldn’t a player, now that their respective unions have fought hard for the right, have the ability to choose where they want to spend the majority of their professional lives? Of course they should and anyone saying different is selfish and nonsensical.

If reporters had opportunities to live anywhere they want and switch to networks and programs for their betterment of their careers and families would they?… Hold up that’s what they have and do now. How can you begrudge someone for taking advantage of the same opportunities that essentially every other professional is afforded?

For those that use the older players as examples of continuity and competitive fairness in wanting to stay in their situations and overcome adversity in beating their rivals instead of joining them… I call BS on that too. Sure some of the older players did not move to other teams, but that was because they essentially did not have the rights or opportunity to do so. But, once they did, most of the older players have developed selective memory about the fact that most of them at some point switched teams either for money or competitive balance or both.

I get that sports reporters are more like reality show participants than actual reporters these days. Television face time is given to the most bombastic personalities and it is easy to criticize superstars at every turn to trend and maintain ratings.

Only Kevin Durant knows the real reasons that he left OKC for Golden State. Money was ultimately not the biggest factor. He was going to be wealthy at either place. He left a good team to join another. He has never said anything but positive things about OKC where he had played every year beside his rookie campaign when the team was still in Seattle. However, let’s keep it one hundred… San Francisco versus OKC as a man of color…with all things being equal I’m choosing the Bay area all day.

At the end of the day it is Durant’s right to choose and any extended criticism of the matter is just ridiculous.

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#kevindurant, #LeBronJames, #stephenASmith, #Goldenstate, #ClevelandCavs, #MLB, #NBA, #NFL, #freeagency