Are Black Athletes Being Played?

Guestpost: It seems my boy Dollar Bill the Hot Tub Don (pronounced all at once like A Tribe Called Quest) has decided to get off the sideline and into the game, so to speak. He weighs in on this post with a question as to the dearth of African American sports agent and why do so many professional athletes end up broke.

The teams competing in the NBA finals have finally been decided (Sorry Lebron, I really thought it was your year.) and I, like most sports fans, am preparing for what looks like a good series. In fact, I’m getting the hot tub prepared and warmed up even as I write this. And this year the hot tub will be extra hot, caliente hot! But back to the business at hand.

Now, I’m a huge sports fan. Not the fanatical type that shows up at games all painted up or sitting in the stands in the dead of winter with my shirt off (kids don’t need to see all this on TV), but an avid sports devotee nonetheless. In fact, my day usually begins and ends with SportsCenter and a quick glimpse at espn.com.

But I’m not simply a casual observer. I view sports with a critical eye as it usually indicates or reinforces many truths about our society and especially our culture. And one thing that has always struck me as odd is the conspicuous absence of black sports agents and the number of millionaire athletes who will soon be dead broke. Perhaps the two are interrelated, but there are other implications.

Yes, there are some black sports agents, but the small percentage of black sports agents does not correlate with the vast percentage of professional black athletes. At last count, blacks made up about 67% of the athletes in the NFL and 75% in the NBA (aaregistry.com), but the percentage of those athletes patronizing black agents is miniscule.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not attempting to posit some kind of affirmative action quota system here. If I am sick, I want the best doctor regardless of his/her racial or ethnic background. So, it would follow that I understand the mid level or free agent type of player retaining the very best personnel to maximize his earning potential and marketability, and if that personnel just happens to not be a person of color, then so be it. However, once you've achieved a certain level of success and financial security, like say a Lebron James and Kobe Bryant, shouldn't you be compelled to address the dearth of black sports agents?

And perhaps closely related to this issue is the fact that most of those athletes making obscene amounts of money now will be dead broke in the near future. Consider these statistics from the Sports Illustrated March 23 article, “How (and Why) Athletes Go Broke”:

§ By the time they have been retired for two years, 78% of former NFL players have gone bankrupt or are under financial stress because of joblessness or divorce.

§ Within five years of retirement, an estimated 60% if former NBA players are broke.

Unbelievable right? The list of broke or nearly broke former pro athletes reads like a who’s who of the sports word: Saints all-time leading rusher Deuce McAllister, Panthers receiver Muhsin Muhammad, and let’s not forget hapless Broncos running back Travis Henry who was jailed for non-payment of child support to his nine kids by seven different my baby’s mommas.

While I respect and admire a number of professional athletes, someone has got to begin using their head for something besides a hat rack.

Despite the millions of dollars professional athletes earn, the lion’s share of the money to be made through professional sports ends up in someone else’s pocket. Yeah, you get to floss for a few years, but then where are you at? What are you left with? It’s almost the plantation system revisited; team owners and franchises and agents, among others, earn money by the sweat of the black athlete’s brow, and the athletes are more than content with it. In effect, even as they play, they are being played.

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