Earlier this week I wrote an article on how much of a mess the Los Angeles Lakers have become. In the Lakers’ defense, at least their trials and tribulations are confined to the sport of basketball. The Brooklyn Nets are almost as messy as the Lakers are on the floor. Away from it, they’re taking dysfunction to a whole new level.
Before we get into all of the off-court drama, let’s take a look at their on-court woes. Today’s meek surrender at home to the Chicago Bulls drops the Nets to just 2-5 on the season thus far. It’s worth noting, however, that given the myriad of long-term absentees that the Nets are having to reintegrate (Ben Simmons, Joe Harris, Seth Curry – even Kyrie Irving to an extent) it’s a touch unfair to grade the Nets this early. Realistically they’ll need a good 25 to 30 games under their belts before we can pass definitive judgment.
Right now, though? Brooklyn just doesn’t work as a basketballing entity.
Despite the attacking talent up and down the roster, the Nets’ offense has been hijacked by Ben Simmons complete lack of assertiveness. Even if/when he plays like a Draymond Green style short roller, teams simply lay off of him and take away his passing options, knowing that he doesn’t want to go to the hoop. In the Nets recent loss to Dallas, several Mavericks tried to convince officials that a fouled Simmons was in the act of shooting (which he was not) such is the Australian’s fear of shooting the ball.
Defensively Simmons isn’t back to his All-Defense best yet, either. That may come with time; it may not. Either way, the issue is roster fit. Simmons is big and strong enough to bang bodies with power forwards and some centres, but he is in no way a feared rim protector, never averaging so much as a block per game at any point in his career. That’s where Nicolas Claxton comes in. He’s a wonderful shot blocker who dovetails beautifully with what prime Simmons brings to the defensive table. Unfortunately, though, their fit on offense is horrific. Neither can shoot (though at least Claxton tries to) which jams up the Nets spacing.
Kevin Durant is – once again – playing out of his mind, but that leaves the Nets fortunes falling onto the shoulders of a 34-year-old with miles on the tires. This wasn’t what he envisioned when joining the team.
This morning the news came out that head coach Steve Nash was fired (personally, I’d like to think he quit and that general manager Sean Marks offered to fire him so that he could be paid out in full as a thank you for putting up with all of this) after growing visibly more frustrated with his lot in life.
There is no way to accurately gauge Nash’s first stint as a head coach. Under his watch, the Nets had literally the best offense ever put on an NBA floor. Was that down to the talents of KD, Kyrie Irving and James Harden or was it Nash’s ability to knit it all together? Also under Nash, the Nets have exhibited one of the worst cultures in living memory. Was that due to the, let’s call them idiosyncrasies, of his stars or is it Nash’s inability to reign in his chargers?
The Nets are now reportedly looking to replace Nash with current/former (delete as appropriate) Boston Celtics head coach Ime Udoka, confirming that as a club they disregard both Jews (more on that below) and (allegedly – Vendetta lawyers) women. Whilst Udoka’s force of personality would no doubt drag that locker room back into line, he comes with a reasonable amount of recent baggage, himself.
Durant, of course, made it clear in the off-season that he wanted Nash gone. To that end: mission accomplished. It will be interesting to see if the other man in KD’s sights – Sean Marks – makes it through the season. In hiring Udoka and all that he brings to the table, I was moved to recall this:
With all of that drama covered (takes a deep breath and a shot of whisky) let’s move on to the rather prominent elephant in the room: Kyrie Irving.
Long a conduit between the general NBA fan and radical conspiracy theories (like this, this, and this), Irving has outdone himself with his recent promotion of the movie Hebrew to Negroes: Wake Up Black America that boosts, amongst other things, antisemitism. I won’t go into detail about the film as I couldn’t do a better job than what Jon Blistein at Rolling Stone did here. And from this point forward, I’ll simply refer to it as the film.
Irving’s flat-earth dalliance was quirky and kind of fun, in its own way. At least he later apologised for it. His vaccination stance was at best irresponsible but there is a very vocal minority that for some reason agree with him. Promoting Alex Jones is bizarre and more than a bit dicey. Propagating this film is outright dangerous.
In a recent post game press conference, ESPN’s Nick Friedell went back and forth with Irving over his tweet promoting the film, the crux of which was: Irving acknowledged that he has a platform, before less than 60 seconds later saying that his platform didn’t exist and was simply a myth made up by the press; that tweeting a link to the film doesn’t necessarily mean he was promoting said film; refused to acknowledge that people will see his tweet as an implicit promotion of the film; refused to apologise for the tweet, in the process making himself out to be the victim.
Irving has since confirmed that he has in fact watched the film, eliminating any possibility of him blindly tweeting about something that he may not have fully understood and thus also doing away with any benefit of the doubt that Irving may have carried.
Just as startling was Irving’s defiance on this issue. Instead of apologising if the tweet caused offense (the classic non-apology, apology route) or at the very least deflecting the question, Irving doubled down. “I’m not going to stand down on anything I believe in”, was followed up with, “I’m only going to get stronger because I’m not alone. I have a whole army around me”.
Irving doesn’t specifically call for violence, but that last statement is frightening. There are enough deranged people out there who hold similar views to Irving that are just waiting for one of their ‘heroes’ to give the order, implied or otherwise.
On the off chance that one of those hate-filled individuals that have seen Irving’s statements don’t take it as a literal Call to Arms, his actions still extend and, in the minds of some, validate their own views and vilification of the Jewish people. As a black man who has at times taken on the role of social justice warrior, Irving should understand better than most the power of his tweet. That at a bare minimum it promotes a falsehood about a peoples based on nothing but their ancestry and all of the dangers that come along with that. Given Irving plays basketball every day alongside a man named David Duke, you would think this concept might be front and centre to him.
Irving pushed back on Friedell and other reports in his presser, asking: “Did I do anything illegal? Did I hurt anybody? Did I harm anybody?”. To answer: no, he did nothing illegal. Irving’s actions do hurt people, however. Be it very publicly or via the quieter casual racism that particular ethnic and religious groups (amongst others) are subjected to on a daily basis.
The basketball going public are already making their feeling heard. At the Nets home game against Indiana earlier this week a series of front row fans donned their yarmulke’s and t-shirts bearing the statement ‘fight antisemitism’.
A Jewish friend of mine – a Nets fan since moving to the States from Australia at the height of the Jason Kidd era New Jersey Nets – who frequents Nets games with his children told me that he ‘just can’t be a Nets fan right now’ and that he was unlikely to attend a home game again whilst Irving remained on roster.
These are good starts – if nothing else, Irving’s tweet reinforces the concept of People Power. Ultimately it’s how the Nets and the NBA themselves respond to this that will prove fascinating.
The NBA banned Donald Stirling and has effectively pushed Phoenix Suns owner Robert Sarver out the door for their own racist acts. Kryie, though, isn’t an owner. Losing him to the league will make a very real difference to the on-court product. Because of that, expect the league to take a different approach.
Can Irving be, for want of a better word, rehabilitated? Can he become more educated on the matter? Would that even help, given it might just provide grist to Irving’s conspiratorial mill. Will the team or the league institute a ban of some sort? If so, what sort of precedent does that set?
Certainly, Irving’s sponsors can take action. Nike and Pepsi (amongst others) would be wise to cut ties with the increasingly controversial point guard, much like Adidas (amongst others) recently has with The Artist Formerly Known As Kanye West.
There are complexities in the relationship between Jewish people and Black people that as a middle aged White man, I simply will never fully understand. That said, engagement and discussion should be encouraged. Education should be offered and enlightened views promoted.
Kyrie Irving’s views are clearly not enlightened. They have, however, been widely promoted.
Irving will surely claim that under the banner of free speech he can promote whatever the hell he pleases. In a broad sense, I agree – free speech should be protected. Free speech, however, doesn’t mean one is free from consequence.
The consequences of Irving’s actions – both to others and to himself – remain to be seen.
