The Curious Case of Kevin Love

The entire world is commenting on the lack of playing time for Kevin Love, who is clearly the best big man for Team USA, and among the best overall players on the whole team.

This odd lack of playing time is puzzling to many observers, but the fact is, we here at White Basketball have seen this exact situation time and time again. It is part of very regular pattern. In American basketball, quality White players are denied minutes and starting spots even when they are outplaying and out-producing the Black player in front of them.

The pattern is also holding true that this usually happens under White coaches. Why? No one seems to know. But once you start to look for it, it is everywhere, as I have documented extensively on this blog.

The first step to overcoming this discrimination is acknowledgement of the problem, and I hope this blog will help raise awareness. Getting articles like this publised by ESPN certainly helps:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/19616/team-usa-no-love-for-love-from-coach-k

ISTANBUL, Turkey -- One of the big mysteries surrounding Team USA at the World Championship is why Kevin Love's playing time has been so limited.

He has been, by far, the most productive and aggressive player for the Americans when it comes to producing points and rebounds off the bench, but he is playing behind Andre Iguodala at the 4 spot and behind Lamar Odom (and sometimes Tyson Chandler) at center.

In yesterday's victory over Iran, which I dissected in my postgame column with a critical eye regarding the Americans' offense, Love led the team in scoring with 13 points despite playing the fewest minutes (just under 11) of anyone on the roster.

"I just go out there and try to be productive. Coach said today everybody's in their roles. I think for me, I know Lamar is going to be the starting center, and he's going to play a lot of minutes. So when I get the chance to come in, whether I'm playing 5 minutes or 25 minutes, I have to get the job done. And I feel I've done a good job contributing thus far," Love told ESPN.com.

Love played only 5:20 in Team USA's 2-point victory over Brazil, 13:24 in the 22-point victory over Slovenia and 13:14 in Team's USA's tournament-opening 28-point victory over Croatia.

That's a total of just 42 minutes in five games, yet Love leads Team USA in total rebounds with 28 (Kevin Durant is second with 27, and Odom has 26) and in offensive rebounds with 10 (Iguodala is 2nd with 6). He also has shot 50 percent from 3-point range and 61 percent overall, and he is the team's fifth leading scorer (8.3 ppg) behind Durant (18.8), Chauncey Billups (10.0), Derrick Rose (9.5) and Rudy Gay (9.0).

The Synergy of White Basketball

It's a simple fact: White basketball players are better team players, and make those around them better. Chalk it up to better passing, more court awareness, less selfishness, better basketball IQ, and probably other reasons.

Look at the list of best 5 man units in the league, www.82games.com/0809/USORT13.HTM:

Denver's best unit includes Kleiza and Andersen.
Utah's best unit includes Korver, Kiriklenko, and Okur.
Portland's best unit includes Blake, Fernandez, and Pyzybilla.
Indiana's best unit includes Murphy and Foster.
Miami's best unit includes Quinn.
Chicago's best unit includes Nocioni.

So why is it that none of these guys starts?

Institutional Discrimination Against American White Basketball Players

Thinking of the massive scale of the European club basketball system, of which the Euroleague 24-team competition is just the tip of the iceberg, is it any wonder there are almost as many foreign whites as American whites in the NBA? Think for a minute about the disparity in developmental opportunities. There are hundreds of professional clubs all across Europe developing their native talent. Nothing like that exists in America.

The European clubs also have an explicit affirmative action policy for their national players, limiting the number of foreigners on each club squad. Thus, they can't just stock their team with 10 American players in the hopes of winning their games, they are forced to develop their local white talent.

American whites, obviously, have no such protections. In fact, they play against a huge handicap: the American collegiate system. America runs its sports through the school system, not a club system like Europe, so our minor league system is the college game.

Number one, that system is biased in favor of early development. Your long term interest in and success in sports is heavily influenced by your state of physical development when you are junior high and high school. Thus, if you are not physically mature in 9th grade, you won't even make the team in a large school, or at best you will be riding the bench, in either case, severely impacting your future potential in a negative way.

It is enlightening to note that black boys enter puberty almost two years sooner than white boys. Blacks also tend to start school at a later age on average, and get held back in early grades more. Thus, whites in the school system are facing a significant disadvantage in terms of physical development compared to blacks in the same grade level. Not playing in junior high will obviously affect your ability to make the team in high school, and not playing in high school makes it real hard to get recruited by a college.

And at the college level, the white player faces another huge barrier: colleges are run on affirmative action FOR blacks. Because blacks are worse students, American colleges are always struggling to bring up their black student enrollments, which would otherwise be lower than white enrollment on a percentage basis, making a college subject to legal sanctions under anti-discrimination laws. Athletic scholarships are method number one that colleges use to bring up the number of black students, because athletic scholarships are by definition not concerned with academic quality. Bringing in blacks on athletic scholarships allows colleges to boost their black student numbers in a way that, for some reason, everyone seems to accept. Thus, white are preselected out of athletic scholarships entering college, because of discrimination policy aimed to assist blacks.

Look at the larger racial pattern going on here. The European club system discriminates in the favor of European whites, the American college system discriminates in the favor of American blacks.

And so, where else can American whites turn to develop their athletic potential? The American college system is the minor league for the American pro system, so the bottle neck at the college level of course negatively impacts the number of Whites at the pro level. The bottle neck also impacts the number of American whites who can play overseas, since with no pro or college experience, they have no basis for getting signed to a foreign club contract.

See how screwed the American white basketball player is? Not just on the level of biological discrimination because of later puberty onset, not just personal discrimination based on myths of black athletic superiority (the false idea that "White men can't jump"), but on the institutional level that gives an opportunity to play at all, the American white faces huge barriers.

In order to have a level playing field for success, American whites would have a professional league that limited the number of American blacks and foreign whites, like foreign whites enjoy in their national leagues.

Facing discrimination by having to compete against older and more developed blacks in the school sports system, and discrimination in college admission policies, and discrimination limiting participation in foreign leagues, a professional league based on affirmative action to develop American whites is a matter of justice and equity mandated under civil rights legislation.

Before the days of federally mandated school integration and affirmative action, American whites developed quite well, and were some of the best ball players in the world. If we end the systematic discrimination against them, they can easily rise again to the same high levels again.

American Whites in Euroleague

The Euroleague competition is made up of 24 teams: 5 Spanish, 4 Italian, 3 Greek, 2 Turkish, 2 French, and 1 each from Croatia, Germany, Israel, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Serbia, and Slovenia. Each team has a majority of players from its home country on its 15 man roster. However, many players, even stars, play for clubs that do not represent their home country. There is an average of 3 Americans on each club.

You would think that for a continent that is overwhelmingly white, the European basketball leagues would be more friendly to American white basketball players. In fact, that is not true. American whites are rare in the Euroleague.

There are a grand total of 9 American whites in the whole league, and two of them actually play for other countries officially (Ireland and Scotland), and I am including one guy who is probably biracial. I am not including the one white Canadian.

The only ones you would probably recognize are Pat Burke and Casey Jacobsen. The others: Shuan Stonerook, Jared Homan, Adam Chubb, Jobey Thomas, Joey Beard, Drake Diener, and Robert Archibald. That is it, in the whole Euroleague competition. There are 74 total Americans on the Euroleague teams, meaning that whites represent just 12% of the American ballplayers. That sounds low, but it is about equal to the ratio of white to black Americans in the NBA.

However, there are many other Americans playing for other European clubs. However, there are so many clubs in the many different national leagues, it would be a major research project to track them all. To wit:

There are a host of basketball leagues in Europe, clubs organized as part of national leagues, such as a German league, a Polish league, an Italian league, and so on. The Euroleague is the top tier interleague, continent-wide competition, a league for the best of the best, the champions of the national leagues.

Thus, for example, the Italian league has 16 teams, 4 of which also play in the Euroleague. The Spanish league has 17 teams, of which 5 play in Euroleague. The German league has 18 teams, only 1 of which is in the Euroleague.

The Euroleague teams play games in their national league, as well as Euroleague games in between their national league games. The seasons are simultaneous.

The second-level continental competition is called the Eurocup, which consists of 32 teams. The third-level is the EuroChallenge, also consisting of 32 teams. Obviously, the situation is complex, and there are a ton of pro-basketball players in Europe, way more than in America.

Nocioni should be a starter

Andres Nocioni (6'7 225 SF) led the Bulls to victory in their last preseason game, scoring 26 points, 9 in overtime, playing 44 minutes as a starter in the absence of Deng.

Nocioni's high-scoring game capped a pretty solid preseason, and highlighted how well Andres plays when given the minutes. In the five games he played more than 20 minutes (averaging 28 mpg), Andres averaged 18 points on only 12 shots, a very efficient clip, along with 5 rebounds.

Just by way of contrast, the starter Deng in the preseason also averaged 28 minutes, but scored only 11 points on 10 shots, along with 5 rebounds.

This reveals a classic case of someone being declared better simply because they've been declared starter, and given better minutes. Andres' numbers are dragged down by the games he played 15, 11, and 6 minutes, but WHEN GIVEN COMPARABLE MINUTES, his numbers are actually better than the guy starting in front of him.

Deng was a lottery first round draft pick (seventh overall) out of Duke, entering the league in '04.
Nocioni was undrafted out of Argentina, also entering the league in '04. Notice, from the stats below, how Andres has always been given fewer minutes.

Yet, compare the years when they both averaged the same 27 minutes. Given the same minutes, Andres scored more points (13.0 vs 11.7) on fewer shot attempts (10.1 vs 10.6), and gathered in more rebounds (6.1 vs 5.3).

Yet, Deng's minutes then shot up, to 33 and 37, while Nocioni's then fell to 26 and 24.

So what is the argument? You could say that Deng had greater "upside" and has contined to progress as a ball player. BUT, I have already shown that this very preseason, when given the same minutes, Andres is more productive!

From his very first year, Deng has been given more minutes, so a casual glance at the stats makes Deng appear the better player. But when they average the same minutes, Andres shows greater productivity, both in the past and now!

So why is Deng starting, and Andres backing him up? Obviously, the answer is right there, in black and white.



year 1:
LD 27:18 mpg, 11.7 ppg, 10.6 shots pg, 5.3 rpg
AN 23:23 mpg, 8.4 ppg, 7.4 shots pg, 4.8 rpg

year 2:
LD 33:23 mpg, 14.3 ppg, 12.2 shots pg, 6.6 rpg
AN 27:18 mpg, 13.0 ppg, 10.1 shots pg, 6.1 rpg

year 3:
LD 37:30 mpg, 18.8 ppg, 14.9 shots pg, 7.1 rpg
AN 26:30 mpg, 14.1 ppg, 11.0 shots pg, 5.7 rpg

year 4:
LD 33:47 mpg, 17.0 ppg, 14.2 shots pg, 6.3 rpg
AN 24:36 mpg, 13.2 ppg, 10.7 shots pg, 4.2 rpg

Chris Andersen should be starter

Chris Andersen put together a fabulous preseason for the Nuggets, and has clearly earned a starter's spot, outplaying both the starters at PF and C (Martin and Hilario).

In playing just about the same mpg each, Chris averaged more total rebounds, more offensive rebounds, more free throw attempts, and way more blocks, than either Martin or Hilario. He scored less, but only because he took less shots. His scoring efficiency, points per shot, was higher.

Rebounds: CA 8.3, KM 5.6, NH 5.3
Offensive Rebs: CA 2.5, KM 1.4, NH 1.2
Blocks: CA 2.2, KM 0.4, NH 1.0
FTAs: CA 5.5, KM 3.4, NH 5.0
Scoring Efficiency (points / FGA): CA 1.5, KM 1.25, NH 1.4

When a guy is a better scorer, rebounder, and defender, that usually means he is the starter, right? So why isn't he starting? Hmmm, why could it be??? Is it because Chris is missing the one most vital ingredient for playing in the NBA, dark skin?

Zaza Pachulia not ready for burial

Zaza Pachulia (6'11 280 C) has perhaps not resigned himself to oblivion on the Hawks bench quite yet. Last night, Zaza led Altanta to victory with the game winning basket, scoring 18 total (on 12 shots) and ripping down a team-leading 9 rebounds, including a dominant 6 on the offensive glass.

Zaza saw a major dip in minutes last year, as Atlanta went with the Dominican rookie Horford at C.

In '05-06, Zaza logged 31:23, and put up 11.7 ppg and 7.9 rpg (43% of them offensive), 5.2 FTApg
In '06-07, Zaza logged 28:06, putting up 12.2 ppg and 6.9 rpg (41% of them offensive), 5.2 FTApg

In '07-08, Horford logged 31:23, and put up 10.1 ppg and 9.7 rpg (32% offensive), 2.6 FTApg

Hmm, looks like a downgrade to me, as Zaza is much more skilled on the offensive end, including offensive rebounds.

Let's look at the patterns this preseason.
Zaza has played 20 mpg, producing 10.7 ppg (on 5.7 FGA) and 7.3 rpg.
Horford played 27 mpg, producing 9.6 ppg (on 7.8 FGA) and 8.0 rpg.

So, Zaza gets more points on less shots, almost the same rebounds, while playing only 75% of Horford's minutes.

And he's the backup? WTF?

Ryan Anderson rebounds strong

Ryan continues to demand attention in NJ, despite his coach refusing to give him real minutes.

Tonight, Ryan actually led his team in rebounding, with 9 total, including 3 offensive, in his meager 16 minutes. The starting PF (Yi) had only 4 rebounds, in his 31 minutes. Good game overall for Ryan actually, putting in 11 points on 9 shots, plus an assist and a block.

Ryan is an all-around player, a great shooter and rebounder, a rare combo in the typical NBA big man. What is not to like about this rookie, who, surprise surprise, went undrafted? Despite being first team all-PAC-10 as a sophomore, averaging 21.1 points and 9.9 rebounds per game, in fact, leading the whole conference in scoring.

And he has to ride the pine behind a Chinese guy who is totally unproven? How do you justify that?

How do you explain how Yi was the 6th pick in the first round of the draft last year? And Ryan goes undrafted? How do you explain that?

Unless you realize one key fact: the NBA is an entertainment product, driven by marketing, and is NOT a pure sporting competition based on basketball excellence. When you realize that one key fact, it all makes sense, because highly-skilled pale-skins like Ryan just aren't part of the NBA international marketing plan.

Ridiculous discrimination, squared and cubed

This is the crap that really pisses me off. A white player will play a fantastic game when given minutes, outplaying the starters coming off the bench, and the next game, rather than being rewarded with some PT and the chance to keep the hot streak going, they actually see a drastic reduction in minutes.

Cases in point:

Ryan Anderson, NJN, yesterday scores 20, on 11 shots, playing 25 minutes against Boston. Today, buried, playing only 9 minutes. Not even like he was playing bad, scoring 4 on 2 shots, with 3 boards, but it looks pathetic even touting it. No one can get to double digits as the 10th sub in 9 minutes of PT, and what is point of mentioning single digit production...

JJ Redick, DNP tonight against the Hawks. WTF? Was he was injured, because what other reason is there for a DNP??? Two nights ago JJ scores 14 on six shots and led the team in plus-minus in his meager 21 minutes. The rookie who started ahead of him and played 26 minutes that night, scoring 2 (on eight shots!!!) to go with his 3 TOs, HE GETS REWARDED tonight with 33 minutes. Are you kidding me???

Blake Ahearn, against Toronto, scores 15 (2nd on team) on only 9 shots in his 21 minutes. Then in the very next game, he gets thrown in for a grand total of 4 minutes of PT, at the very end of the game against Denver, no less (but STILL hits a clutch 3 to help Minny win).

Where is the logic or sense in all this? Unless discrimination against white Americans makes sense, and it's logical not to play your best players.