The international era
Lapchick, a keen observer of the manner in which sport reflects society and vice-versa, finds the topic intriguing — and at times amusing. “We publish a ‘Racial and Gender Report Card’ across all sports,” he says. “It gives the percentage of people of color and of females participating in sports at various levels.

“And every year when that comes out, we consistently get a barrage of e-mails asking, in effect, ‘When are you going to take up the cause of white athletes?’”

If you wonder why some writers are so fawning toward the ’86 Boston Celtics (I won’t name names), it may have something to do with the fact that, besides having a charismatic cast of players, they were the last NBA champions to start three white players (Bird, Walton and Kevin McHale). And that the former two represent the entire collection of whites who have won the MVP award since 1974. And that 1986 really comprised the last days of honky-tonk (minus the “tonk”) hoops in the NBA.

Bird won his third consecutive, and final, MVP award in 1986. No white player has won the Maurice Podoloff Trophy since.

One year before Bird won that trophy, Georgi Glouchkov of Bulgaria became the first player from an Eastern bloc country to be drafted by an NBA club (the Phoenix Suns). One year after Bird was named ‘86 MVP, Hakeem Olajuwon of the Houston Rockets became the first international player voted to start in an All-Star Game.

It was the end of one era and the start of another; the dawn of outsourcing NBA All-Star starters. Since 1994, an international player has been voted to start in every All-Star contest except one (1996), while a white player has been voted to start only once, and that was the league’s all-time leader in both assists and steals, Stockton, in 1997.

“Obviously, it’s hard not to notice the trend of international players,” says Lapchick, one of the most respected voices in the country in matters that intersect society and sport. “They’ve been playing basketball at a higher level for some time now. But I wonder if the number of white American starters in the NBA is much different than that of white international starters in the NBA.”

Lapchick makes a salient point. The number of international white players who start is roughly the same as that of American whites. However, as of Jan. 6, according to NBA.com, there were 77 foreign players from 32 different countries in the NBA. Even Iran is represented (Hamed Haddadi, a 7-foot-2 center for the Memphis Grizzlies). Meanwhile there are 36 white players, or less than half as many white players as international players, in the NBA. Thirty-six white players is exactly 10 percent of the league.

And to think that in the first six seasons the NBA staged an All-Star Game, between 1951-1956, only twice did a non-white player even make an All-Star roster.

To ask why is to venture into territory that, while charted, is no less precarious. Using the All-Star starter metric, it is obvious (as if years of watching SportsCenter was not proof enough) that players of African descent dominate the game. You’d have to go all the way back to 1961 to find an All-Star Game in which more than half the starters were not African-American (the four blacks who started that game at the Onondoga County War Memorial Coliseum in Syracuse, N.Y., were only Oscar Robertson, Elgin Baylor, Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain).

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Over the past couple decades, the influx of international talent has not had that much of an impact on the league’s black demographic (Kobe, LeBron and Chris Paul are doing just fine, thank you). However, the number of white players has certainly decreased. Whether you want to ascribe that to socio-economic conditions, genetics or video games is your call.

Pushed to the fringe
It is worth noting, though, that the NBA’s current pool of white players seem more often to be plumbed from the rural heartland — Jimmy Chitwood stock — than urban, or even suburban ones. Mike Miller of the Minnesota Timberwolves grew up in South Dakota. Nick Collison, Kirk Hinrich and Kyle Korver are from Iowa.

In fact, as often as not a suburban-bred white NBA player is the offspring of a retired pro player (e.g., Dunleavy, Love, Szczerbiak, Walton). And finally — and why should you be surprised? — no individual school has more white players in the NBA than Notre Dame, with four (Murphy, Chris Quinn, Matt Carroll and Rob Kurz) and maybe five next season (Luke Harangody).

Evolution breeds adaptation, which in turn breeds evolution. Lapchick foresees an even greater infusion of international players. “I think you’re going to see more Chinese players, more African players,” he says. “And maybe even players from places the NBA has never had one before. The NBA took a tour to India last year for the first time, for example.”

Slumdog Millionaire, the hoops edition.

And maybe it’s coincidence, or maybe not, but while only three white players rank in the top 100 in the NBA in scoring at present (Lee, Murphy and Ridnour), eight of them are amongst the top 40 in 3-point shooting percentage. As a group, then, you might say that white players are being pushed out of the prime hardwood real estate. They’re literally surviving on the fringe, for the most part.

Then again, situated out beyond the arc, white players are closest to the two demographic groups indigenous to the league where whites are still in the majority: head coaches and fans.

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