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      Michael Jordan Was an Activist After All

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      Jordan wasn’t vocal about social justice like today’s N.B.A. stars, but his secret brand of activism is a key reason they have the spotlight now.On the first road trip of his N.B.A. career, in the fall of 2001, Etan Thomas looked out the window of the Washington Wizards’ team bus and was stunned by the massing crowd around the hotel.He asked Christian Laettner, the veteran forward: “Is this how the N.B.A. is?”Laettner laughed. “No, young fella,” he said. “This isn’t for us. They’re here for M.J.”This was lesson No. 1 of Thomas’s two-year tour with Michael Jordan, who had returned to the league from a three-season absence following his last dance with the Chicago Bulls. Along with him came the deluge of lights, cameras, action.The young, inquisitive Thomas couldn’t help but wonder: ‌What about the activism? Why wasn’t Jordan doing more with his spotlight?“I was thinking that Michael didn’t lend his voice to causes where he could have helped,” ‌Thomas said in a recent interview, 20 years removed from his time with the man on whose shoulders the sport dramatically rose in popularity worldwide.Jordan’s profile helped increase the N.B.A.’s popularity.Jonathan Daniel/Allsport, via Getty ImagesJordan played his final N.B.A. game on April 16, 2003, scoring 15 points in a 20-point defeat in Philadelphia. That season, with him turning 40 in February and dealing with a knee that Thomas remembered could swell like a grapefruit, Jordan averaged a modest (for him) 20 points per game. He played 37 minutes a night and in all 82 games‌ — part of a legacy that should admonish, if not embarrass, today’s load-managed N.B.A. elite.Jordan retired as a six-time champion with many believing, and now still insisting, there was no one ever greater. Such conviction has only been heightened by the widespread appeal of “The Last Dance,” a 10-part E‌SPN series about Jordan’s Bulls that was broadcast in 2020, and the current feature film “Air,” starring Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Viola Davis.The flip side of Jordan mania was the derision directed at him for appearing not to use his enormous popularity and platform as a premier Black athlete for the benefit of social or political change. For all the interviews he did, what arguably remains the most memorable quotation attributed to him — “Republicans buy shoes, too” — ostensibly rationalized his unwillingness to endorse Harvey Gantt, an African‌‌ American Democratic candidate in a 1990 North Carolina Senate race against Jesse Helms, a white conservative known for racist policies.On a broader scale, it reflected the narrative that followed Jordan into the 21st ‌century: that he was a hardcore capitalist without a social conscience. Sam Smith, the author in whose 1995 book the quotation originally appeared, has many times called it an offhand remark during a casual conversation‌‌ — more or less a joke — and said he regretted including it. In the ESPN series, Jordan said he made the comment “in jest.”In recent tumultuous and polarizing years, Jordan has become more public with his philanthropy and occasional calls for racial justice. And given two decades to consider the precedents he set, the boardrooms he bounded into and how he ascended from transcendent player to principal owner of the Charlotte Hornets, the context has shifted enough to ask: ‌Did he actually blaze a different or perhaps more impactful trail to meaningful societal change?Jordan purchased a majority stake in the Charlotte Hornets, then known as the Bobcats, in 2010. His team hosted the All-Star Game in 2017.Getty ImagesThomas, who after his nine-season N.B.A. career has been an activist, author and media personality, said his reconsideration of the 1990s Jordan narrative began before Jordan retired for good.He recalled sitting in the Wizards’ training room one day with Jordan and a member of his entourage when Jordan asked him about a book he had noticed Thomas reading‌‌. Thomas recalled it was likely Eldridge Cleaver’s “Soul on Ice.”“That got a conversation going and Michael’s guy started talking about the charitable things he did without publicity,” Thomas said. “He mentioned an event at an all-white golf club, where of course they let Michael play, but there were no Black members, and how Michael threatened at the last minute to back out if they didn’t change their policy.”Thomas added: “I told Michael, ‘That’s something people should know and then maybe they wouldn’t be saying the things they do about you.’ He just said‌, ‘I don’t do that.’ And his guy said‌‌, ‘See what I mean?’ After that, I could never hold him up as the antithesis of the activist athlete, the opposite of Muhammad Ali and Bill Russell. It’s not that simple.”In “Air,” Davis, powerfully portraying Jordan’s mother, Deloris Jordan, dramatically foresees momentous change ‌benefiting ‌African American families of modest means after she had engineered a groundbreaking deal with Nike upon Jordan’s 1984 entry into the N.B.A.‌A screenwriter’s indulgent license, perhaps, but who can argue that Jordan didn’t actually do a total rewrite of the script in the allocation of corporate revenues to athletes? Or that the Nike deal, which guaranteed him a cut of every sneaker sold, doesn’t make him the godfather of the name, image and likeness revenues flowing into the pockets of college athletes today?For these reasons, ‌Harry Edwards, the sociologist and ‌civil ‌‌rights activist, said on the “Bakari Sellers Podcast” in February 2021 that Jordan should not be scolded for his sole focus on commercial brand-building across the 1980s and ’90s.The first version the Air Jordan Nike shoes that Jordan wore. The shoe line remains incredibly popular, 20 years after Jordan’s final N.B.A. game.Focus on Sport via Getty ImagesHe called it “an era where the foundations of power were laid,” ultimately empowering Jordan’s super-wealthy descendants to ‌‌affect communities — for example, in LeBron James’s staunch commitment to public education in his ‌‌hometown, Akron, Ohio.Len Elmore, the former N.B.A. center who retired from playing in 1984 to attend law school at Harvard, said he, like others who venerated Ali and 1960s activist icons, was once bewildered by Jordan’s ‌reluctance to speak out on issues of equity‌‌. Those issues included sweatshop conditions abroad, where ‌Jordan’s signature sneakers were produced to be sold at premium prices.“Michael’s years didn’t have what the ‌‌’60s had — the Vietnam War, the ‌‌civil ‌‌rights movement,” said Elmore, a ‌senior ‌‌lecturer in Columbia University’s Sports Management Program. “There was more of a smoldering of race, but it wasn’t on fire.He added: “I’m not defending Michael’s not taking a stand. But the reinterpretation of his legacy depends on what you saw then and what you see now.”While Thomas wasn’t around the league during Jordan’s prime as a player and pitchman, his view of that era is based on interviews he has done for his books and his podcast, “The Rematch.” Those years, he learned, followed one strategic mandate: N.B.A. Commissioner David Stern’s preoccupation with marketing.“He was 100 percent clear in those days‌‌ — everything was about growing the game, the bottom line,” Thomas said. “He was dead set against anything that might turn off the fan base. Even when I came in and made ‌‌antiwar comments, David told me‌, ‘Be careful.’ ”David Stern, left, became N.B.A. commissioner in 1984, the year Jordan, right, started his professional career. Together, they helped spread a positive image of the N.B.A. around the world.Ron Thomas/Associated PressStern, who died in 2020, straddled a fine line between his mostly progressive politics and fear of alienating consumers. Jordan followed along as a polished yet cautious spokesman on controversies, such as the one that engulfed Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, who in 1996 was suspended by the league for refusing to stand for the national anthem for religious reasons.Was this approach the reflection of a man intrinsically averse to risk? Did Jordan share the vision attributed to his mother in this year’s film? Was he unaware that he might have been famous and leveraged enough to have had it both ways‌‌ — to both speak out about social causes and remain a potent pitchman?James and other more outspoken contemporary stars‌ have adopted that approach — “changed the narrative,” ‌Thomas said — and with the apparent support of Stern’s successor, Adam Silver.It’s doubtful that Jordan, in his day, could have built what he did while doubling as a crusader, said Sonny Vaccaro, who‌‌ played a crucial role in corralling Jordan for Nike.“The league had to grow first,” said Vaccaro, who is played in‌ “Air” by Damon. “Look, Michael had his troubles‌ — with the Republicans quote, the gambling, with some of his teammates. But he opened the door. He changed the world — only no one knew how much he was changing the world until the next century.”He added: “LeBron can only be the way he is today because Michael made it OK for corporations to put their money, huge amounts of money, on athletes, especially Black athletes. Over time their power and voice has grown.”The Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James, left, has become one of the most vocal players about social justice and has followed in Jordan’s footsteps with commercial branding, including popular Nike shoes.Jason Miller/Getty ImagesSome would add, for better or worse, that the pendulum has swung too far in the players’ favor. It is not — or should not be — about what stars earn, given the staggering sums that franchise stakeholders have been reaping in recent sales. (Jordan will likely be no exception if he secures a deal he’s reportedly been negotiating to cash out of the $275 million he invested in his 2010 purchase of his team.)But Jordan-inspired superstar leverage has led to an era of chronic and chaotic team-hopping that, for older fans and some news media members, seems antithetical to their relished Jordan era. For all the disdain he had for Jerry Krause, the Bulls’ general manager‌ during their championship years, Jordan worked with the players provided to him, mercilessly pushed them to succeed and ultimately reaped the rewards.To emphasize that point, Jordan’s process, said David Falk, his longtime agent, was purer.“Michael was part of a generation that went to college for a few years, identified with a program like North Carolina, instead of switching A.A.U. and high school teams whenever it suited you,” Falk said. “I asked Michael once if he ever thought about playing with Magic Johnson and Larry Bird‌. He said‌‌: ‘Hell, no. I wanted to kick their butt every night.’ ”Jordan created his own controversies, mostly related to high-stakes golf, including the case of a $57,000 debt he paid by check to a man who was later convicted of money launder‌‌ing. But even his legendary casino preoccupation seems more quaint now given professional sports’ unapologetic marriage to the online gaming industry.Jordan, at 60, deserves to be viewed through the lens of an evolved narrative, given how high he has raised the bar for athletes outside the lines, a legacy that will resonate far into the future.Twenty years after his last professional jump shot, he is arguably still the most leveraged player in sports. If he were so inclined, he might even have the muscle, upon walking away from basketball, to make a competitive run for the seat once held by Helms. His pitch, of course, was always bipartisan. More

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      N.B.A. Blames Economy for Hiring Freeze and Budget Cuts

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      In a memo, the league said it was “facing a very different economic reality than just one year ago.”The N.B.A., citing “economic headwinds,” instructed league office staff on Tuesday to reduce expenses and significantly limit hiring for the rest of the fiscal year, according to a memo obtained by The New York Times.The memo, sent by Kyle J. Cavanaugh, a league executive, and David Haber, the league’s chief financial officer, told staffers to halt hiring, with limited exceptions, and cancel some off-site meetings or hold them virtually. Travel, entertainment and other expenses also will be cut, according to the memo.“Like other businesses in the U.S. and globally, the league office is not immune to macroeconomic pressures and taking steps to reduce expenses,” Mike Bass, an N.B.A. spokesman, said in a statement to The Times.The memo said the N.B.A. was “facing a very different economic reality than just one year ago.” It continued, “We are seeing significant challenges to achieving our revenue budget with additional downside risk still in front of us.”The N.B.A.’s next fiscal year begins in October, roughly lining up with the start of the 2023-24 regular season. Bass, the spokesman, did not address questions about which league initiatives would be affected by the cuts or if there would be layoffs.The changes come just before the N.B.A. playoffs and a day after the league noted setting a record for attendance and sellouts for the 2022-23 regular season. On April 1, the league and the players’ union announced that they had tentatively reached a new collective bargaining agreement that would go into effect next season. The agreement, which awaits ratification by players and team owners, includes a midseason tournament with bonuses for players and another luxury tax tier for high-spending teams.During negotiations, the Boston Celtics’ Jaylen Brown, an executive vice president in the union, told The Times that players wanted “more of a partnership” with the league, including the sharing of more of the N.B.A.’s revenue streams.Over the past year, many companies, particularly in the technology sector, have commenced layoffs and other cost-cutting measures as the economy was hit with rising inflation and interest rate hikes. The N.B.A. is also not the only sports league that has aimed to reduce costs. The N.F.L. recently reduced staffing for its media arm. Walt Disney Company has begun laying off thousands of employees. ESPN, one of the N.B.A.’s broadcast partners, is a Disney subsidiary and is expected to be affected.Last year, N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver said the league expected to take in roughly $10 billion in revenue for the 2021-22 season, between sponsors, television deals, attendance, merchandising and other revenue streams. The N.B.A.’s television deal with ESPN and Turner Sports expires after the 2024-25 season. The new deal, in a crowded marketplace that now includes streaming companies, is expected to provide a significant boost in league revenue.The league had a round of layoffs in 2020 right as its season was about to restart at Walt Disney World in Florida in the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, though at the time the league said the cuts were unrelated to the pandemic and instead were aimed at future growth. More

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      The NBA Was Redesigned for Drama, and It’s Working

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      The last day of the regular season saw flashes of brilliance from the best teams, punches thrown and disappointing defeats.The N.B.A.’s Western Conference has been a confusing mash of disarray this season, with few teams seeming capable of separating themselves and the rest mired in a chaos borne of some combination of injuries, disillusion and malaise.The drama reached its apogee during a two-and-a-half-hour period on Sunday afternoon. Seven games between West foes tipped off simultaneously and determined half the postseason seeding, including which teams could rest for a week and which could be knocked out in the play-in tournament before the playoffs even start. There were blowouts, shenanigans and punches thrown.It was one of the most exciting days of the season, and highlighted part of N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver’s ethos: that change, though it may come at a cost, can be good.Kyle Anderson and Rudy Gobert had to be separated after a heated altercation during a timeout. pic.twitter.com/HVuPNdjrxs— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) April 9, 2023
      The world of sports is an obstinate and unyielding realm, where tradition reigns. Two years ago, Silver met resistance when he introduced the play-in tournament, in which the teams seeded seventh through 10th compete for the last two of eight playoff spots in each conference.Luka Doncic of the Mavericks argued that it was unfair for teams to play a whole season to land among the top eight seeds just to face elimination in the play-in tournament. The Lakers star LeBron James said whoever came up with it should be fired.But two weeks ago, Silver said all but four of the league’s 30 teams still had a chance to make the playoffs. On Saturday afternoon, with two days of games left, the N.B.A. posted a dizzying, color-coded graphic on Twitter with 64 scenarios for the final West seedings.Did any team really want to face the Warriors, the defending champions?How dangerous could the Clippers be once Kawhi Leonard locked in, and if Paul George was healthy?A team with James and Anthony Davis is fearsome no matter its record, and their Lakers have excelled since the trade deadline.On the other hand, Sacramento (No. 3) and Denver (No. 1) haven’t inspired fear in conference opponents this year. The Kings, who are in the playoffs for the first time since 2006, were well aware that some teams hoped to face them in the first round.“If I’m another team, I’m targeting us, too,” Kings Coach Mike Brown told reporters last week. He paused and shrugged. “I would target us too. And we’re the only ones that can change that narrative.”None of this intrigue would have been possible without the play-in tournament.This is an era when player injuries have concerned teams enough that they have been cautious by occasionally resting them. The league tried to address the wear and tear on players’ bodies several years ago by reducing the number of back-to-back games on the schedule. Adding games with a play-in tournament seemed counterintuitive to that.It’s undeniable, though, that it made the end of the season more intriguing. With more teams in the playoff hunt, that left fewer teams willing to coast for more favorable draft positioning.The Golden State Warriors beat the Portland Trail Blazers by 56 points on Sunday. Klay Thompson had six 3-pointers in the win.Craig Mitchelldyer/Associated Press“It makes it more exciting and it keeps things really interesting all the way down the stretch,” Warriors Coach Steve Kerr said recently, adding: “I’m watching all of it for sure.”There are certain lulls in the 82-game season during which stakes are hard to manufacture. The last month of the season is often one of those times. Added interest during the regular season could help the league as it looks toward its next media rights deals after the 2024-25 season.Every team played on Sunday. The slot at 1 p.m. Eastern time offered a slate of mostly meaningless Eastern Conference games. At 3:30 p.m. the real drama began.Golden State (No. 6) dismantled the Portland Trail Blazers by 56 points, but it was only the team’s 11th road win. At about the same time, the Dallas Mavericks, with no chance to make the playoffs, lost to the San Antonio Spurs by 21 points. At the trade deadline, the Mavericks had acquired Kyrie Irving from the Nets to play with Doncic and seemed to be a championship contender. And yet there they were, ending the season by losing to a 22-win team while under investigation for tanking.The Lakers finished the season with an emphatic win over the Utah Jazz to claim the seventh seed.The Lakers had spent most of the season floundering, with injuries further hampering a mismatched roster that struggled to flow. They improved at the trade deadline, but by that point they needed a furious rally to give themselves even a chance at the playoffs. Finishing with the seventh-best record in the West was an accomplishment, but one that took a lot out of them.Their reward is another game on Tuesday, in the play-in, when their stars could use some time to heal from their bumps and bruises.The Suns, settled in the fourth seed, sat their stars on Sunday, but the Clippers played their stars as they fought for better seeding.Rick Scuteri/Associated PressThe Lakers’ opponent Tuesday, the Minnesota Timberwolves (No. 8), had the most dramatic day. They had spent all season trying to adjust to adding center Rudy Gobert, for whom they had traded away a treasure trove of assets last summer. On Sunday night, during the second quarter of their game against the New Orleans Pelicans, Gobert punched his teammate Kyle Anderson during a verbal altercation. A few minutes earlier, Timberwolves forward Jaden McDaniels broke his right hand by punching a wall.McDaniels is out indefinitely, and Minnesota suspended Gobert for the play-in game against the Lakers. It’s not the kind of drama the N.B.A. wants, but it did have people talking. It also showed another example of how much can go wrong with a blockbuster trade for a star.Then there were the Suns and the Clippers. The Clippers were playing to stay out of the play-in tournament and the only way to ensure that was to win — even if that meant facing a star-studded Phoenix team in the first round.“I’m not a fan of the play-in, me personally, because we didn’t make it last year and we fought so hard to get a top-eight seed,” Clippers Coach Ty Lue said last week. “You don’t make it, it’s tough. But we knew today was a big game to stay away from that.”The play-in tournament is not the last break with tradition Silver will oversee. This month the league and the players’ union agreed to add an in-season tournament to the regular season. It will add more games, but could also add drama. This weekend’s theatrics may be taken as evidence that it doesn’t hurt to try. More

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      Domantas Sabonis’s N.B.A. Stardom Is Fueled by Family Legacy

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      The Sacramento Kings big man Domantas Sabonis plays with the bruising style of his father, Arvydas. It has made him an All-Star and helped the Kings break a 16-season playoff drought.For Domantas Sabonis, basketball has long been it.“Never a plan B,” Sabonis, 26, said. “Only basketball.”In many of his baby pictures, Sabonis said, he is holding a basketball. The same goes for his 1-year-old son.This makes basketball a sort of generational inheritance. Sabonis’s father is Arvydas Sabonis, a Lithuanian player who dominated in Europe, spent seven seasons in the N.B.A. and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011.Now, Domantas is the Sabonis dominating. In his seventh N.B.A. season, he is a three-time All-Star and has helped the Sacramento Kings clinch a playoff spot for the first time since 2006, breaking the longest active postseason drought in the four major North American men’s professional sports leagues. Sabonis is the N.B.A.’s leading rebounder, one of its best passing big men and one of its most efficient scorers.From his game, one can easily draw a straight line to his father. At 7-foot-3, Arvydas was a slick passer with refined post skills and immense upper body strength. It wasn’t unusual to see him go at Shaquille O’Neal and hold his own. Domantas’s hands are drawn to loose balls around the basket, and defenders bounce off him like rubber. Arvydas had more of a shooting touch; Domantas is quicker, though not fast by today’s standards. Slow centers who stay near the basket have gone out of vogue over the last decade, but the 6-foot-11 Domantas has turned this bruising style of play in the paint into success for the Kings. In some ways, Domantas’s game is a stubborn tribute to Arvydas.“It’s the eyes, the fingers, the hands, the little gestures,” said his older brother Tautvydas Sabonis, who goes by Tuti. He added: “You throw a pass. It leaves his fingers like this and it’s like, that’s 101 Dad.”Tuti, on a video conference call from Lithuania, held his hands out wide to demonstrate.Sabonis is averaging 19.2 points per game and a league-best 12.4 rebounds per game this season.Frank Franklin Ii/Associated Press“The most important thing is they both get pissed the same way,” he said. “It’s the same characters, same mind-set. It’s ‘rah, rah, rah, rah, rah!’ Lithuanian. All the swear words you can imagine. Throw in a little English. Throw Spanish in there.”Tuti, 30, is a basketball coach in Lithuania and played professionally in Europe. So did the other Sabonis brother, Zygimantas, 31, who goes by Zygi. Domantas was born during the playoffs of Arvydas’s rookie year in the N.B.A. with the Portland Trail Blazers. A sister, Ausrine, was born the next year. Domantas and Tuti recalled that the Blazers’ practice facility had a children’s room where they would try all of the Gatorade flavors and play the “floor is lava” game while they waited for practice to be over. Players like Scottie Pippen and Rasheed Wallace would refer to Zygi, Tuti and Domantas as Sabonis Jr., Sabonis Jr. Jr., and Sabonis Jr. Jr. Jr. Guard Damon Stoudamire told them that his Afro came from sticking his fingers in an electric socket.Shortly before Arvydas retired from the N.B.A. for the second and final time, in 2003, the family moved to Spain. It wasn’t until Domantas turned 10, when he started playing basketball and watching YouTube highlight videos, that he understood his father’s prodigious basketball legacy, he said.“We knew he was a basketball player, but we saw him as our dad,” said Sabonis, who like his father is comfortable out of the limelight. “We didn’t know what he actually was.”He said his father didn’t push any of the children to play basketball. Neither did their mother, Ingrida Sabonis, a former Miss Lithuania. As a teenager, Domantas played professionally for the Spanish club Unicaja Malaga before he spent two years at Gonzaga. Tommy Lloyd, who as an assistant coach helped recruit Domantas to Gonzaga, said he talked to Tuti but didn’t meet Arvydas until after Domantas had committed to the college, which was unusual.Lloyd said Arvydas told him: “‘My son should have the right to make his own decisions. And I feel good as a parent allowing him to do that since I was never allowed to.’”The Blazers drafted Arvydas in 1986, but it took almost a decade for him to make his N.B.A. debut. Lithuania was part of the Soviet Union, whose officials wanted Arvydas to remain an amateur so he could compete in the 1988 Olympics. After the Olympics, Arvydas doubted his ability to compete with the N.B.A.’s best because he’d had multiple Achilles’ tendon injuries. In 1990, Lithuania declared independence from the Soviet Union. Two years later, Sabonis played for the Lithuanian Olympic team, helping it win a bronze medal.(The American men — the Dream Team — got much of the attention at the 1992 Olympics, but Lithuania’s tie-dye warm-ups sponsored by the Grateful Dead also became a cultural sensation.)Sabonis is unusual in his limited shooting range, but his skill in the paint has been a boon for the Kings.Thearon W. Henderson/Getty ImagesArvydas Sabonis spent seven seasons with the Portland Trail Blazers, beginning in the mid-1990s.Doug Pensinger/Getty ImagesThe Blazers kept pitching Arvydas on coming to the United States. After years of wooing from lawmakers, diplomats and basketball executives, he finally relented.“If not N.B.A. now, never,” a 30-year-old Arvydas said at the time. “Last chance.”Arvydas, who declined a request for an interview, spent seven seasons with the Blazers between 1995 and 2003. He skipped one year, citing mental and physical exhaustion. Now he texts Domantas after each of his N.B.A. games, despite the 10-hour time difference between Sacramento and Lithuania. And if he’s not texting Domantas, he’s texting the siblings.“I think my dad’s our best friend,” Tuti said. “He’s amazing. He watches all of Domas’s games. He’s always calling me: ‘Are you watching?’ I’m like, ‘Dad, I’ve got to work tomorrow.’”While Arvydas has never coached his children, he’s always given one particular piece of advice.“You got to take care of the point guard,” Tuti recounted. “You’re not going to take care of the shooting guard because he’s there to shoot. The point guard, he’s going to give you the ball to score. So if you’ve got to take someone out to drinks, this is the guy you take care of.”For Domantas, that is De’Aaron Fox, a lightning quick 25-year-old point guard who has been Sabonis’s partner in lifting Sacramento’s fortunes. Fox has played in Sacramento for his entire six-year career, but Sabonis joined him only last season in a trade from Indiana.“They want me to be one of the main pieces and have a say and change something around,” Sabonis said. “And that’s just motivation.”Mike Brown, who is in his first season coaching the Kings, designed an offense that leaned into Sabonis’s passing skills, which helped balance the floor and give Fox more space to operate. It has been a resounding success: Sacramento has the N.B.A.’s best offense, and this season Fox made his first All-Star team. Fox said that Sabonis is one of the league’s best finishers and passers, and he sets strong screens to dislodge pesky defenders for his guards.“I think any offense can be successful around someone like that,” Fox said.Tautvydas Sabonis, No. 11, is one of Domantas’s two older brothers. He played in Europe and is now a basketball coach in Lithuania.Robertas Dackus/Euroleague Basketball via Getty ImagesSabonis’s hard-nosed play has easily won over teammates and coaches, and made him a fan favorite. He’s been playing through a thumb injury for much of the season, but he has not shied away from contact, whether in the post or while diving for a rebound. Brown recalled Sabonis apologizing to him once for a bad turnover. But Brown wasn’t concerned.“‘As hard as you play, I don’t know if I can ever get mad at you for turning the ball over,’” Brown recalled responding to Sabonis. “I said, ‘Just go sit down.’”It may seem daunting for Sabonis to follow in the footsteps of his famous father, especially in the withering spotlight of the N.B.A. But he insists that his father’s basketball legacy has not created extra pressure. In fact, he has embraced it, wearing his father’s No. 11 in college and with Indiana before arriving in Sacramento, where No. 11 is retired.“Since I was a kid, you always hear: ‘Your dad is better than you. Your dad’s this. Your dad is that.’ You hear it all the time in every game,” Sabonis said. “But if anything, without that, I wouldn’t have been where I am. If anything, I use it as fuel to be better.”Brown said that Sabonis “probably wants to be more impactful and better than his dad to show his dad, that yes, I can do this as your son.”Lloyd, the former Gonzaga assistant who is now the head men’s basketball coach at the University of Arizona, said that Domantas used to tell him that he was motivated by respect for his fathers and brothers.“He felt like he was carrying on the Sabonis basketball legacy,” Lloyd said. “And it’s something he took really, really, really serious. I don’t want to say there was a fear of failure, but there definitely was a want to succeed for the family name.”As far as their N.B.A. careers go, “Sabonis Jr. Jr. Jr.” has already surpassed his father, though the league never got to see Arvydas at his best. Domantas has helped revitalize a Kings franchise desperate for relevance. There’s been no intergenerational trash talk, though.“My dad loves it,” Tuti said. “He’s your son. He’s playing at the highest level ever. It’s not about accolades. It’s not about this. It’s just putting on the television and getting to enjoy your own son.” More

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      The N.B.A. and Its Players’ Union Reach a Tentative Labor Deal

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      The collective bargaining agreement, which is said to create a new in-season tournament, must be ratified by the players and team governors.The N.B.A. and the N.B.A. players’ union have agreed to a new collective bargaining agreement that will ensure labor peace, the league announced Saturday morning. The new deal must be ratified by N.B.A. players and the league’s board of governors before it becomes official.The deal includes the addition of an in-season tournament with monetary rewards for players and coaches who win it, the removal of marijuana as a banned substance, and a second luxury tax tier, according to a person familiar with the terms who requested anonymity because the deal is not ratified.The new collective bargaining agreement will begin next season and last for seven years, with a mutual opt-out clause after six years, the same person said.Although some expected that this collective bargaining agreement would lower the age limit for entering the N.B.A. draft from 19 to 18, the sides did not agree to that. The age limit will remain at 19, which means most players coming out of high school will need to wait a year before entering the draft.The league announced the deal in a tweet at 2:59 a.m. Saturday. The parties had agreed to extend the midnight deadline for either side to opt out of the current agreement, which has been in effect since 2017.Had the sides not agreed or come close by Friday, the league intended to exercise the opt-out clause, according to Commissioner Adam Silver. That would have caused the current collective bargaining agreement to expire on June 30 instead of next year, compressing the time the sides would have had to avoid a work stoppage.The N.B.A. has not had a work stoppage since the lockout in 2011, which delayed the start of that season until Christmas.This deal is the first negotiated by executive director Tamika Tremaglio, who began her tenure as the head of the union in 2021, and for CJ McCollum, the Pelicans guard who became its president in August of that year.The second luxury tax tier appears to be a compromise from what the league had wanted. The league had been concerned that some teams were at too great of a disadvantage because a small number of them vastly outspent the others through salary cap exceptions within the existing luxury tax system. This season, the Golden State Warriors and the Los Angeles Clippers are paying luxury taxes and spend far more on their star-studded rosters than any other team. To prevent that spending imbalance, the league had hoped to institute a fixed sum that teams could spend on salaries, but the union made clear early on that it would not accept any hard spending limit for teams.The sides hope the new tier will allow more teams to enter the luxury tax.Adding a tournament during the N.B.A. season had long been a priority for Silver.“It’s something that I remain excited about,” Silver had said during a news conference in September. “I think it continues to be an opportunity within the current footprint of our season to create some more meaningful games, games of consequence, during an otherwise long regular season.” More

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      As Bargaining Deadline Looms, N.B.A. and Players’ Union Enjoy Friendly Ties

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      The connections between team owners and players are stronger now than in previous years. A deadline to opt out of the current collective bargaining agreement offers a test of that relationship.Tamika Tremaglio, the executive director of the N.B.A. players’ union, organized a friendly social gathering ahead of this season between union officials and N.B.A. league executives: party games, cocktails and even a five-on-five basketball game. They would spend much of the next few months negotiating against each other for the next collective bargaining agreement, and Tremaglio first wanted them to have a little fun together.Tremaglio and N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver competed against each other in an egg toss.“For our benefit,” she said, “Adam and I, we didn’t have to play basketball.”The tenor of the relationship between the league and its players’ union seems a far cry from the contentious moments that have dotted their history: the players’ very first attempts to unionize in the 1950s; tense years in the 1990s; and antagonistic battle in 2011 that led to the league’s most recent lockout.Recently, the N.B.A.’s labor landscape has been peaceful, but the strength of that collegiality is being tested by pressure points during a negotiation that has addressed issues like the age limit for players entering the league, a possible in-season tournament and the league’s luxury tax system.One of those pressure points might come this week as the deadline for either side to opt out of the current agreement looms on Friday. Silver said on Wednesday afternoon that he can foresee a deal being reached by Friday, but the league would likely opt out if not. That would make the current collective bargaining agreement expire on June 30 instead of after the 2023-24 season and add urgency to the negotiations for a new agreement. Tremaglio said in a statement that the union does not plan to opt out.“If we don’t have a deal and the league decides to opt out, it will be disappointing considering all the work both sides have put into the negotiations, and the fair nature of our requests,” Tremaglio said.Whatever happens will be set against the backdrop of an era in which N.B.A. players and team owners have largely cooperated, making their dynamic look far different from the labor fights that have played out recently across numerous industries in the United States.People on both sides refer to the relationship between players and team owners as a partnership, and they often develop friendships with each other. During this period, star players have immense power over their careers on and off the court, and the league has benefited from lucrative media rights deals.“It’s not like you can draw a line and say previously it was bad and now it’s good or anything else,” said Jeffrey Kessler, the principal outside counsel for the union, who has been working with the union since 1978. “It just varies over time, shaped by a lot of different forces, shaped by the economics at the time, shaped by the personalities at the time, shaped by the experience. They go through different cycles.”Finances, as they often do with collective bargaining in any industry, have shaped the tenor of the relationship for decades. In 1954, when N.B.A. players first tried to organize, back pay for a group of players was among their top issues. The league recognized the union three years later.Over the next several decades, issues like pensions, free agency and players’ share of league profits became sticking points.“We were the first ones to establish a percentage of the growth revenue going to the players,” Junior Bridgeman, a former player, said, referring to the 1983 C.B.A., two years before he began his tenure as president of the players’ union as the league’s popularity was growing because of Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan. “No one thought at the time that the numbers would get to where they are today and it would be as meaningful as it is today.”Today, Bridgeman is a business magnate who built a fortune in the food and beverage industry, but when he first attended bargaining sessions, he considered it an unofficial curriculum for a master’s in business administration. He saw what mattered to the team owners and how they communicated.“Most of the meetings ended up being contentious to some extent,” Bridgeman said. He added: “We went to one meeting that lasted all of seven minutes. We got up and walked out. It was the art of negotiation in real life.”In 1995, the league locked out the players for the first time. Union leadership and the league’s representatives had agreed to a deal, but players were unhappy with basic terms and the way the negotiation was conducted. A group of high-profile players filed an antitrust lawsuit and moved to decertify the union.They reached an agreement before the season began, but the deal had an opt-out clause that eventually led to the longest lockout in league history, nearly canceling the 1998-99 season. The sides reached an agreement in January 1999.Silver has worked for the N.B.A. since 1992, spending much of his early years in N.B.A. Entertainment. He became the league’s deputy commissioner, serving under David Stern, in 2006, the year an age limit of 19 went into effect for the draft.The league’s next work stoppage came in 2011. Stern appointed Silver as the league’s lead negotiator for those talks. Silver chuckled at the title.“When David Stern is in the room, he’s the lead negotiator,” Silver said in a phone interview Monday.Stern, who died in 2020, was indeed still the face of those negotiations. His biting wit and tough demeanor led to memorable moments. Billy Hunter, then the union’s executive director, once said he thought the league’s claim that it was losing $400 million a year was “baloney.” Stern, whose family owned a deli, quipped in response: “I grew up at Stern’s delicatessen. He has his meat wrong.”As a player, Michael Jordan had been heavily involved in union battles. His name was on the antitrust lawsuit Kessler filed on the players’ behalf in 1995.In 2010, he became the majority owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, now the Hornets, and took an active role in labor negotiations later that decade. He is now the chairman of the labor relations committee.“The expectation maybe from some people on my side that when Michael was at the table, everything would be hunky-dory,” Silver said. “‘Oh, Michael Jordan is saying it. Therefore that must be a fair position.’”As a player, Michael Jordan, right, helped the league increase its popularity and was active in union battles. As a team owner, he took an active role in labor negotiations in the 2010s.Chuck Burton/Associated PressPlayers, he said, didn’t agree. Silver recalls the star guard Chris Paul, who was the president of the union from 2013-21, telling him: “No question I admire and trust Michael Jordan, but we’re now, in essence, adversaries in this process.”Silver believes the relationship between players and the league is more trusting now than in previous bargaining cycles, in part because the league is more open about its finances.“It doesn’t necessarily mean that it makes it easier to get a deal done,” Silver said. “But we’re now able to jump over what used to be months of back and forth over what the so-called truth was regarding the league’s financials.”Paul, who was drafted in 2005, said he has seen players become more interested and involved in understanding the business of the league now than earlier in his career. Silver has made a point to build personal capital with players. He also fostered a close relationship with Michele Roberts, Tremaglio’s predecessor, who held the post from July 2014 to January 2022. Roberts declined to be interviewed for this story to avoid the appearance she was trying to influence negotiations from retirement.“That’s one of his strengths,” Jerry Colangelo, who was an executive for the Bulls in the 1960s before leaving to work for and later own the Phoenix Suns, said of Silver. “He’s a communicator, a terrific communicator. David was a little bit more arm’s length.” He added: “Both are really good negotiators. Both really could be very tough when they need to be tough. But on a personal basis, Adam is more available.”Both Silver and Paul said that doesn’t mean negotiations are easier.“They always get contentious,” Paul said.Where that productive relationship helps is in times of unexpected upheaval, like when the coronavirus pandemic hit and caused the league to shut down operations in 2020.“The shutting down of the business, playing in a bubble in Orlando, all those things were far outside the scope of our agreement,” Silver said. He added: “The trust enabled us to sit down with the leadership at the union and with the leaders and with the players executive committee, and we worked through some really difficult issues.”Their shared stakes also helped them navigate the work stoppage that occurred in the bubble when players, led by the Milwaukee Bucks, decided not to play after a white police officer in Kenosha, Wis., shot a Black man named Jacob Blake. Before games resumed, players met with team owners over videoconferencing and asked them to commit to support social justice concerns.During the pandemic stoppage, Silver said he and other key league executives began having daily calls with Paul, guard Kyle Lowry and center Dwight Powell, who were part of the league’s competition committee. They checked in on how players were feeling about issues like returning to play, their own safety and the racial justice movements that were sweeping the country.When CJ McCollum replaced Paul as president of the union in August 2021, he was added to those calls. Silver said the calls are no longer daily, but still happen regularly.“We talk about everything,” McCollum, a Pelicans guard, said of his relationship with Silver. “The state of the game, where the game is at, ways to improve.”This season they discussed topics like an uptick in travel calls and changes to foul calls. When the W.N.B.A. star Brittney Griner was imprisoned in Russia, McCollum said they sometimes discussed what they could do to help the efforts to free her.Tremaglio, the N.B.P.A.’s executive director, said the party last fall helped her bolster her relationships with league executives, too.“We are in business together, right? We have a partnership,” Tremaglio said. “For me, I tend to do business with people that I like and know something about.” She added: “I thought it was really critical before we go into negotiations that we had a chance to really get to know one another.”There were some new faces in the union and new faces in the league office, and most of their interactions during the past several months had been held remotely.“I share her view,” Silver said. “I thought it was a great idea.”He added: “When you negotiate with a players’ association, or frankly any collectively bargained relationship, you get a deal done and then the next day you’re dealing with those exact same people and you’re living under that deal.”Tremaglio said the union won the games, though league sources dispute that contention. The stakes were lower that day, but their competitive natures persisted. More

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      4 People Accused of $13 Million in Pro Athlete Fraud Schemes

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      Prosecutors said the people, including a former N.B.A. agent, took money from professional basketball players and spent it on luxury goods and home renovations.Four people were arrested Thursday and charged with collectively defrauding four professional men’s basketball players out of more than $13 million, according to Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York.In one scheme, three players were allegedly persuaded to purchase more than $5 million worth of life insurance policies at an enormous markup. In another, a fourth player spent $7 million to buy a women’s professional basketball team, but prosecutors said the money never went toward a purchase. In the third scheme, a player spent $1 million to fund a player representation agency that never existed, according to the indictment.“These defendants believed that defrauding their professional athlete clients of millions of dollars would be a layup,” Williams said in a statement. “That was a huge mistake, and they now face serious criminal charges for their alleged crimes.”Darryl Cohen, Brian Gilder, Charles Briscoe and Calvin Darden Jr. were each charged with one count of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Each charge carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.Cohen, who was formerly a broker at Morgan Stanley, was also charged with one count of investment adviser fraud. Briscoe, who was formerly a certified N.B.A. agent, was also charged with one count of aggravated identify theft.Cohen, Gilder, Briscoe and Darden could not be reached for comment, and court filings did not list lawyers for any of them. Brandon Reif, a lawyer who previously represented Cohen, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.In a statement, Morgan Stanley, where Cohen worked from 2015 to 2021, said he had been “terminated” in March 2021 and had since been barred from the securities industry. “We fully cooperated with the investigation and have resolved clients’ claims related to Mr. Cohen,” a spokeswoman for the firm said.The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission also filed a civil complaint against Cohen.The identities of the professional athletes that prosecutors say were defrauded were not released. But many of the details of the life insurance scheme appear to match claims made by Jrue and Lauren Holiday, Chandler Parsons and Courtney Lee, who previously described allegations of being defrauded by Cohen to The New York Times.Jrue Holiday plays for the N.B.A.’s Milwaukee Bucks, and Lauren Holiday, his wife, is a former professional soccer player. Parsons and Lee are former N.B.A. players. They all said they had filed claims against Cohen with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, which oversees brokerage firms.According to the indictment, between about 2017 and 2020, Cohen and Gilder induced three N.B.A. players to purchase about $6.2 million in life insurance policies, from which Cohen and Gilder “secretly profited” about $4.5 million. Cohen allegedly gave about $200,000 of the money to a person with whom he was in a romantic relationship and used the other funds to pay off a former professional baseball player who was threatening to sue him, to pay his credit card bill, and to renovate his home, according to prosecutors.Another plan involved purchasing a women’s professional basketball team, according to the indictment. An N.B.A. player had wanted to purchase the team, but was forbidden from doing so by the N.B.A.’s collective bargaining agreement.The player discussed an “arrangement” with Briscoe, Darden and others, in which the player would indirectly buy the team through a company controlled by one of Darden’s relatives, prosecutors said. The player transferred $7 million to a bank account, which was controlled by Darden, to purchase the team. But instead, prosecutors said, Darden transferred more than $1 million to Briscoe and more than $500,000 to a relative, then spent the rest on cryptocurrencies, a house, luxury cars, art and a piano.Cohen, Briscoe and Darden are also accused of defrauding an N.B.A. player who wanted to start a player representation agency that he would run after he retired, according to court filings. The player gave Briscoe $1 million so the agency could pay expenses involved with signing a highly touted prospect. But prosecutors said the prospect never signed with the agency, and that the purported contract he signed was forged. The money allegedly was transferred to Briscoe, who paid off a debt and gave some of it to Darden, according to the indictment. More

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      Grizzlies Guard Ja Morant Moves Toward ‘Redemption’ After Gun Video

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      Back from an eight-game suspension, the Memphis Grizzlies guard said he had more work to do to improve himself. But there was also a hint of defiance in his approach.MEMPHIS — When Ja Morant checked into his first game in almost three weeks on Wednesday, Grizzlies fans at the FedEx Forum wrapped him in the warm embrace of a standing ovation and prolonged roars.In a way, they offered him a protective shield from the harsh glare of the spotlight that has fixed itself on Morant, 23, ever since he blithely flashed a gun during an Instagram live session and was forced to acknowledge that some of his off-court behavior could hurt his bright future. Before Wednesday’s game against Houston, Morant had missed the Grizzlies’ past nine games — eight of them because the N.B.A. suspended him without pay for the gun incident. He was a little nervous about his return.“Seeing how the fans reacted to me being back definitely helped me a lot,” Morant said. “Made me feel good inside and yeah. It was, I don’t know. …”His voice began to trail off.“I can’t put it into words,” Morant said. “I’m kind of numb right now but thankful for everybody.”Behind the scenes, Morant had offered to come off the bench. The Grizzlies had won six of their last seven games with Tyus Jones starting at point guard. “I didn’t want to come back and mess any of that chemistry up,” Morant said.He had started every game in his four-year N.B.A. career, but he scored 17 points off the bench in the Grizzlies’ 130-125 win over the Rockets. He still showed some of the dynamism that has made him one of the most exciting players in the N.B.A.Morant is averaging a career-best 8.1 assists per game this season.Petre Thomas/USA Today Sports, via ReutersBut his return has included a mix of contrition and defiance, the kind of uncertainty that can sharpen into a course correction or harden into regression. What is at stake for Morant is not just success this season; he could be one of the faces of the league for years to come. He is only 23 and has the skill and the style of a superstar, a brash confidence on the court and the talent to back it up. And now he has experienced one more element of stardom: a glimpse of how quickly it can all go away.N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver noted Morant’s “enormous following and influence” in the announcement of the suspension, which classified the gun incident as conduct detrimental to the league. The Instagram live video was posted early on March 4, when, the N.B.A. said, Morant had been “in an intoxicated state” at a nightclub in the Denver area. Morant soon left the team and checked into a facility in Florida for counseling. He said he spent the time learning how to better deal with stress and improve himself.But the most important thing Morant said this week was that his work isn’t finished.“I’ve been there for two weeks, but that doesn’t mean I’m completely better,” Morant said. “That’s an ongoing process for me that I’ve still been continuing ever since I’ve been out.”The nightclub incident was just one in a series of concerning off-court situations in which people said they felt threatened by Morant or his associates, going back to last summer, according to reports in The Washington Post and The Athletic.During an interview with ESPN last week, Morant indicated he understood that he had played a role in those situations. But on Tuesday, while speaking with a group of reporters for the first time since his suspension, he responded defiantly when asked how he came to realize he was wrong.“I said I had a role, but I didn’t say anything about doing anything wrong, still,” Morant said. “So all those cases is sealed, so I can’t speak on those cases. When I have my time to, everybody will know the actual truth in every incident that I’ve been in.”Morant had rejoined the Grizzlies on Monday, but because he had not been working out while in Florida, he needed more time to prepare for a return. He addressed the team on Monday, but declined to share details of what he had said. It seemed meaningful to his teammates.“He’s talked to everybody, and the way he’s approaching things is very professional,” said Luke Kennard, who was traded to the Grizzlies six weeks ago. “And he’s keeping it straightforward with everybody. That’s what we want.”Morant is in his fourth season with the Grizzlies, having come to the team as a small but electrifying point guard out of Murray State. He is the leader on a talented young team that has been one of the best in the Western Conference all season even as Memphis has worked through extended injuries to key players.Last season, the Grizzlies had the second best record in the West, and businesses all over downtown Memphis painted images of Morant on their windows for the playoffs. The Grizzlies lost to the eventual champions, Golden State, in the second round, in a series that Morant thought Memphis could have just as easily won.Speaking with reporters on Tuesday, Morant seemed hesitant to commit to playing on Wednesday, even though Grizzlies Coach Taylor Jenkins had said he expected him to. Morant said he was “completely sorry” for bringing negative attention to the team and his family. He was defensive at times. He admitted he was uncomfortable standing there. One reporter asked what role alcohol might have played in some of his mistakes, and instead of answering that question, Morant said he “never had an alcohol problem.”On Wednesday morning, Morant smiled and joked with his teammates during the Grizzlies’ shootaround. Blake Ahearn, one of the team’s assistant coaches, looked warily at the baseline where a crowd of reporters had gathered to watch the end of the session.“Lot of people here today,” he said.Memphis had suddenly become the center of the N.B.A. world for reasons it never wanted. And as always, all eyes were on Morant.“He’s been kindhearted, lighthearted, he’s smiling,” guard Desmond Bane said after the shootaround. “I think he’s in a good spot. We had a short conversation and he said it’s the best spot he’s been in mentally since he got drafted.”Tee Morant, right, Ja’s father, wore a hoodie with the word “redemption” on the front to Wednesday’s game against the Rockets. Tee is a regular and vocal supporter at Ja’s games.Petre Thomas/USA Today Sports, via ReutersBefore Morant left home Wednesday afternoon, he said, he reflected on his feelings — the excitement and the apprehension — and talked himself through them. He said he meditated before the game.About 45 minutes before the game began, Morant arrived on the court to warm up, and members of his family sat courtside. Some of them wore sweatshirts with Morant’s image printed on them along with the word “redemption.”“That was my family’s idea,” Morant said. “It’s me coming back after some negative things have been said constantly throughout this whole basically, what, year and a half now? How I felt? Kind of like a redemption, obviously.”There again was a little bit of defiance, an implication that the real problem had been what people said about Morant, not what he had been doing. But he followed it with words that sounded more introspective and contrite.“It could have been worse,” Morant said. “I got a second chance. I feel like it’s only going to make it right. Show who Ja is as a person. And that’s my family’s message with the hoodies.”When fans saw Morant arrive, they started cheering. Jaren Jackson Jr., who scored a game-high 37 points for Memphis on Wednesday, tried to remain stone-faced. That didn’t last long.“I was cheesing,” Jackson said. “I couldn’t hold it in, for real.”Jackson began tracking the cheers: how fans in the lower deck cheered as soon as Morant came onto the court. How the people in the upper decks didn’t see him at first, but then cheered when the video board showed him. How they cheered again when Morant entered the game with about three minutes remaining in the first quarter. How they cheered a first-quarter dunk that Morant had woven through two defenders to make.“We just wanted him back,” Jackson said, smiling.The Grizzlies wrote a feel-good story on Wednesday night, but it is one that is still unsettled.It has been a little more than a week since Morant returned from the counseling center in Florida. It was an extraordinary step to take during an N.B.A. season, but, as Morant has noted, too short of a visit to make the kind of change necessary to assure his future. He will have months and years to confirm the sincerity of his commitment.Morant has the support of Grizzlies fans, who cheered him throughout his return to play on Wednesday.Justin Ford/Getty Images More