Media: LeBron far from first to make ‘slave’ comparison with NFL owners
For LeBron James, the fundamental difference between the NBA and the NFL is the level of respect shown to players by the respective leagues and their team owners.
The Lakers forward, who in recent years has become an increasingly outspoken advocate for professional athletes on matters of race and politics, took the NFL and its owners to task on the latest episode of The
Shop on HBO. “In the NFL they got a bunch of old white men owning teams and they got that slave mentality,” James said. “And it’s like, ‘This is my team. You do what the (expletive) I tell y’all to do, or we get rid of y’all.’ ”
James made the comments in a conversation with business partner Maverick Carter, Rams running back Todd Gurley and actor/rapper Ice Cube.
“I’m so appreciative in our league of our commissioner (Adam Silver),” James continued. “He doesn’t mind us having … a real feeling and to be able to express that. It doesn’t even matter if Adam agrees with what we are saying, he at least wants to hear us out. As long as we are doing it in a very educational, non-violent way, then he’s absolutely OK with it.”
In the NBA, James and others have worn T-shirts during warmups in recognition of victims of police violence with no repercussions from the league.
By contrast, former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick set off years of controversy and debate when he knelt during the national anthem to protest racial injustice. The NFL and commissioner Roger Goodell responded by instituting strict guidelines for player conduct.
The NFL and its owners have faced “slave” comparisons numerous times over the past decade:
In 2011, star running back Adrian Peterson said he league’s labour situation was like “modern-day slavery.”
During a 2017 owners meeting in the wake of Kaepernick’s protest, then-Houston Texans owner Bob McNair reportedly told his fellow owners that, “We can’t have the inmates running the prison.”
Former Texans receiver Cecil Shorts replied: “Inmates, slaves and products. That’s all we are to the owners and others.”
Over the summer, 49ers defensive back Richard Sherman accused Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones of possessing “the old plantation mentality” for requiring his players to stand at attention during the anthem.