Sometimes it seems like we can’t really have anything. In June 2019 at the Oracle Arena, the life of Masai Ujiri, president of basketball operations for the Toronto Raptors, must have flashed before his eyes. In the most glorious moment of his career and perhaps his life, his freedom, dignity and pride were almost snatched from him by a sideline cop – in a moment that was filmed on video and is just as haunting as it is redeeming.
To quickly describe the exchange, a new footage released on Monday shows the officer, Alan Strickland, pushing Ujiri twice and Ujiri doesn’t give up. And when the altercation is physically over, the clip shows that it was certainly nowhere near too psychologically. In one frame, we see Ujiri, now the NBA champion, take the field to celebrate with the team he built. There is a look on his face that every single black person in America immediately understands. It is the embarrassing mixture of perplexity, confusion, shame but fortitude that sometimes wins you over when you are faced with a white person in a position of authority who does not respect you.
There is a look on the agent’s face that says one thing and one thing only: stay in your place.
And while the guy in the green sweater frantically tries to keep the peace, Ujiri, in the next 10 seconds, is dealing with practically his whole life. (Don’t even get me started on the old white couple pointing it out.) Every single black person I know has been through this moment. “Will I seriously let this person disrespect my agency and deserved, never mind, deserved decency?” “Why am I even thinking about it?” Frustration, often fear, then the chilling feeling of resignation that this is just what it is. Racism ruins everything. And it’s never our fault.
I’ll need video evidence that Ujiri actually hit the police officer. From what I read the officer asked him for his credentials. You know very well who that boy is. I hope his idiot does traffic duty next weekend
– Aaron Fancher (@ TeachMeHowTo9er) June 14, 2019
Of course, it can probably also be said that neither the NBA, nor the Raptors nor Ujiri should ever have come close to that type of scenario. But you would be wrong. Do you think it is a coincidence that he is currently the only brother to manage a team in the league? Here’s the thing: Security officers should be there to protect he by the people. Not to protect yourself from him. But, yanno, Blackness resists.
After all that emotion flowing overhead in the clip, something truly amazing happens. Kyle Lowry, the man who has had the game of his life to silence quite a few people who had criticized his consistency on the pitch, saves the day. He reaches out and grabs his leader from the fray, removing him from the mass of people Ujiri was trying to navigate in the first place. Not to analyze it too closely, but what happened next legitimately scared me when I saw it in real time.
Before that scolding was over, the two were already in an embrace. Lowry wasn’t just physically removing Ujiri from safety. He was protecting his pride, his respect: his Blackness. Two seconds later, with Lowry hugging him, Ujiri was looking back at what he had been taken away from. Has been that close to being another black man in jail in Alameda County, California for not having a credential (he had one).
It is almost impossible to understand how incredible this Lowry moment was. Let me remind you that Lowry is the same one who dealt with a true NBA minority owner who pushed him onto the sidelines after a ball went off the pitch. From the front office to the back of the pitch, the black corps, in a league with seemingly the blackest population of all professional sports, gets little or no respect.
Lowry handled that situation with grace and a level of diplomacy that only high-level players can do. But what happened after Game 6 of the 2019 NBA Finals was different. He was protecting.
If your job is to secure the championship and you don’t know who is the president of basketball operations for the team that just won the title, the fault lies with the officer and / or NBA security, not is Ujiri.
THIS IS ALSO INCREDIBLE pic.twitter.com/6n47VAtFia
– Mastermind (@Mastermind) June 14, 2019
At the time, it seemed too obvious an example of how the now gentrified San Francisco Warriors were forced to leave their hometown of Oakland, California on the black side of the bay.
It was two Warriors home court strikes in one series. Don’t let it get to three, because, oh wait, it doesn’t matter. This is just a rule America came up with to throw blacks in jail for the rest of their lives, in case you forgot.
Kawhi Leonard was a fantastic and deserving MVP of the NBA Finals. But for this series, Kyle Lowry was the hero.
At the highest risk and having already achieved the highest reward, Lowry told his friend Ujiri the most significant and sure thing he could have heard at the time: “We’re done. Here“.
Because there is nowhere else to be when you are a winner.
