By Joël Pütz | Sports journalist
It has become a habit over the years, rookies often have to answer lunar questions before their draft and even after it. But some are particularly heavy with innuendo, a bizarre experience that Rex Chapman notably experienced with his owner in the 80s.
Nowadays, the NBA wants to be more and more progressive and ardently defends civil rights for minorities in the United States. But it was not always this way, particularly a few decades ago when the country was struggling to emerge from a dark period of segregationism. A real sociological upheaval whose adjustments have sometimes been complicated to manage, including for franchises.
Drafted in 1988, Rex Chapman spent a dozen seasons on the professional floor. Having played for the Hornets, the Wizards, the Heat and the Suns before retiring in 2000, he never forgot that when he joined the NBA he was almost destined to join certain franchises… for the simple reason that he was white, as he recently said on the show Pablo Torres Finds Out :
I looked at them and asked myself, “What the hell are you telling me?” They said to me, “Rex, most of the season ticket holders are white, the sponsors are white, and the fans are white, so people want to come see people who look like them play,” and I said, ” Are you kinding me ? “.
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The lunar experience lived by Rex Chapman with the Hornets
It is not uncommon for players’ pre-draft interviews with scouts and managers to give rise to bizarre sequences, but this one still seems quite grotesque in the current context. The fact is that Chapman landed in Charlotte, North Carolina, where minority rights still spark debate to this day. As the ex-back explained, his big boss had a lunar question:
Guess who took me in the draft? The Charlotte Hornets, a brand new team in the Bible Belt (geographical area of the US marked by a large population of Protestant Christians, editor’s note). When I arrived in Charlotte, I met the owner for the first time, then he took me to the basement of his house, gave me something to drink and said, “Hey Rex , do you have a black girlfriend? »
I was 19 or 20 at the time and I was so tired of hearing this that he immediately followed up with, “No, no, no, no, no, I personally don’t care.” It’s just, you know, I don’t care. And he said this: “That’s right, we live here in the Bible Belt.” God-fearing people don’t like it. And you shouldn’t do that in public. »
If you wanted to play for the Hornets in the 80s, you obviously had to meet two specific criteria: be white and/or not have an African-American partner. This shows that racial tensions played a preponderant role within the big league…
2024-03-31 19:00:00
#drafted #team #owner #asked #girlfriend
