Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Iguodala: NBA a ‘human organization’
Heat forward goes on CNN to issue a rebuttal to a Trump statement
Miami Heat forward Andre Iguodala, a vice president of the National Basketball Players Association, issued a rebuke on CNN to President Donald Trump calling the NBA a political organization.
Iguodala was interviewed in the wake of NBA players boycotting playoff games this week in protest of systemic racism and the recent shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
“Well,” Iguodala said, “when your people are being treated the way our people have been treated for hundreds of years, it’s not a political organization or a political agenda, it’s a human organization, it’s a human agenda. And that’s where stand on that.
“And that’s why, say, it comes at a point in time where we might haven taken a pause in the entertainment business to shed light upon these experiences that we’re witnessing through the technology, and through the devices that are in one’s hands, and supposed to be part of the process of holding people accountable for their wrongful actions.”
Iguodala’s comments were in
response to President Trump’s comments on the NBA of: “I know their ratings have been very bad because I think people are a little tired of the NBA, frankly, but I don’t know too much about the protests. But I know their ratings have been very bad, and that’s unfortunate. They’ve become like a political organization and that’s not a good thing. I don’t think that’s a good thing for sports or for the country.”
In addition, White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner said: “Look, I think that the NBA players are very fortunate that they have the financial position where they’re able to take a night off from work without having to have the consequences to themselves financially. So they have that luxury, which is great.”
In the wake of that backand-forth, Heat forward Solomon Hill posted Friday on Twitter, “Crazy telling athletes to remove politics or it’s not our job. Politics is basics, it surrounds everything we do as Americans. On the other hand, presidency is being handled by someone with no past political experience at all but we can’t have opinions or demonstrate our rights?”
Iguodala,Hill and the rest of the Heat remain in the league’s quarantine bubble at Disney World, as part of the league’s resumption amid the new coronavirus pandemic.
The Heat have been on the NBA’s campus there since July 8.
Games were postponed beginning on Wednesday and continuing through Thursday and Friday, with a resumption to begin Saturday.
All 13 teams remaining at Disney scheduled practices for Friday, including the Heat.
The Heat closed out their first-round Eastern Conference playoff sweep of the Indiana Pacers on Monday, now awaiting the winner of the first-round series between the Milwaukee Bucks and Orlando Magic, which Milwaukee leads 3-1.
NBA players voted Thursday to resume the season.
Of the stance taken by the league’s players, Iguodala told The Associated Press, “It’s bigger than basketball, but the platform is one of the largest platforms on the entire earth and we’ve got to continue to leverage that platform. The reason why we came down here was continuing to shed light on it. And we didn’t want that to be taken away by those who don’t want us to see that mission seen all the way through.”
Iguodala added in that interview, “As an African American you’re facing backlash no matter what decision you make. You decide to go play, and you’re being chained. But if you don’t play, you’re ungrateful.
“We’re able to go out and be advocates for the issues that have come about before we got here and we’re trying to rid them.
“They won’t be gone before we leave or after we leave, but we going to try to make it incrementally better any way we can.”