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Michael Holley: Why Is Sprewell Villified, Greene Ignored
[The Boston Globe Online][Boston.com]
[Boston Globe Online / Sports]
Is sports thuggery color-coded?
Why is Sprewell vilified, Greene ignored?
By Michael Holley, Globe Staff, 12/18/98
If he wants, Ron Shelton can easily make a sequel
to ''White Men Can't Jump.'' Like the film that
starred Wesley Snipes, Woody Harrelson, and Rosie Perez,
this one would have a heavy sports theme. All the
director would have to do is study the cases of Kevin
Greene and Latrell Sprewell, and, voila, he'd have the
insightful ''White Men Can't Be Thugs.''
Of course, the public wouldn't buy it because, simply,
the public wouldn't know much about it. They wouldn't see
it in the sports and editorial pages, hear about it on
sports radio, or watch it during TV highlights because,
apparently, media outlets experience computer,
microphone, and camera viruses when ''thug'' or ''punk''
or ''hoodlum'' is placed in the same vicinity as a white
professional athlete. When you're a nonwhite athlete, you
get used to the probing of your character and
intelligence, all under the guise of explaining your bad
day on the field/court/diamond.
Some days I hate my profession, but at least it
consistently gets half of it right: I don't think white
athletes should be called thugs, either. Which is also to
say that I don't think any athlete should be assigned
thug status unless it is a self-applied label. But, yo,
I'm certainly not the one to be investigating anybody's
language. I do, though, have questions. Such as these,
directed to all the people who were outraged by Golden
State Warrior Sprewell going after his coach, P.J.
Carlesimo, and choking him last year:
Where ya at?
What's up?
Where ya been?
Why are you so quiet?
Where are the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and
''Sixty Minutes''? Where are the newspaper letter
writers, talk show callers, academics, and psychologists
all telling us about the pathology of any man who attacks
his coach? Where are all the feature stories exploring
the background of Greene, with interviews from his
friends and neighbors? Sprewell hired the same lawyer
O.J. Simpson used (Johnnie Cochran) in his murder trial.
People took that information and acted as if police found
blood on some Bruno Maglis owned by Sprewell.
The public had a jones for Sprewell in 1997 and the media
had no problem accommodating their robust Sprewell
appetite.
Wall Street Journal: ''Jail Sprewell.''
Boston Herald: ''Slam dunk, punk!''
Boston Globe: ''Sprewell decision scores one for the bad
guys.''
New York Post: ''Hoop Thug.''
Time: ''Tall Men Behaving Badly'' and ''corn-rowed
punk.''
Greensboro News & Record: ''A License To Steal and
Strangle.''
New York Times: ''NBA Violence.''
There is no doubt Sprewell has issues. I recognized that
a few years ago when I watched him get into an
embarrassing argument with teammate Tim Hardaway during a
game against the Celtics. The two men had to be
separated, and eventually, Hardaway was traded. Sprewell
also sued the NBA, with full support from his agent, and
then turned around and sued the agent who supported him
while he was suing the NBA.
But if an argument is going to be made that Sprewell is a
thug, based on him being a self-absorbed player who
choked his coach, wouldn't you have to say the same for
Greene?
For those who missed it - and you most certainly did
because it dipped in and out of the news like the
swiftest night crawler - Greene, a Carolina Panthers
linebacker, erupted on the sideline during a game Sunday
and went after position coach Kevin Steele. The coach was
yelling at him, and he didn't want to hear it at the
time. First he told Steele to get out of his face. Then
he put his hands on him.
Greene weighs 247 pounds. He owns a Gold's Gym in
Alabama. He knows how to hurt people. If his teammates
hadn't restrained him, he would have mussed up Steele so
badly that the coach would be able to fit in the tiny
logo that adorns the sides of the Panthers' helmets. That
was clear to anyone who watched the clip of the
confrontation on TV.
Eventually, Sprewell was penalized 68 games and $6
million for his attack. Greene was suspended one game and
nearly $118,000 for his.
Like Greene, Sprewell would have thrashed his coach if
not restrained. Carlesimo is a very pleasant man when he
is not in a gym. When he steps onto a court, he turns
into Major Pain. You can't shut the guy up. Sprewell, who
can be as volatile as his game, went after Carlesimo
during a December 1997 practice after hearing too much of
something. He went after him twice. He even threatened to
kill him.
Sprewell's incident with Carlesimo was not televised. But
if you talk to people, they'll recite intimate details as
if they were ringside watching Mills Lane referee a title
bout. The story of what really happened lies with each
individual who was in the gym that day. Everything else
is lore, the result of imaginations and biases producing
a scene that was never seen.
Which brings us back to a question that many people
(cannot answer or are afraid to answer: Why is that?
I thought of putting the race of each individual in one
of the earlier paragraphs of this story. But it's clear
that I don't have to, isn't it? Apparently, some people
don't believe what their eyes tell them; they believe
what their minds tell them. See one man chase his coach
on TV and he's emotional; hear about another man chasing
and choking his coach and he is a thug, a menace, a
monster. One guy attempted to hurt his coach and one guy
connected, so that makes it different?
This is not about race cards because, quite honestly,
race cards don't exist. There is no casino where a
disenfranchised brother or sister throws down an ace and
says, ''Ha! Race card, you suckers. I win!'' If the
so-called race card were such a trump, there would be no
need for this conversation.
Both Greene and Sprewell attacked their coaches. Excuses
were made for one while the other was and is demonized.
Their stories are the same. Many can't see that. Same old
story.
This story ran on page C01 of the Boston Globe on
12/18/98.
© Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.