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With his team in the NBA Finals, the league expects Mazzulla to give a press conference on every "off-day" between games. It was at Saturday's conference that Vince Goodwill of Yahoo decided to pipe up with a question only progressive media writers seem to care about these days. Mazzulla's response was an instant classic:
Goodwill: Hey Joe, Vince Goodwill, Yahoo Sports. For the first time since 1975, this is the NBA Finals where you have two black head coaches. Uh, given the plight sometimes of black coaches in the NBA, do you think this is a significant moment? Do you take pride in this? How do you view this or do you not see it at all?
Mazzulla: Wonder how many of those are, or have been Christian coaches?
(awkward silence)
Voice off camera: David Alrich (next reporter in line for question)? ...
But let's go back to Mazzulla's response. The coach himself never specified or clarified precisely the meaning or implications of his words. And in fairness, given that they could mean a couple of different things, that might explain the awkward silence after his response.
But the simplest explanation is that Mazzulla was pointing out the arbitrary nature of Goodwill's question. Why ask about race? A coach's race has no bearing whatsoever on the athletic abilities of the players or their preparation for the finals. So Mazzulla's point might easily have been, "Why ask about race rather than say, a different arbitrary category like faith?"
If Goodwill (or anyone) responded by saying to Mazzulla, "It doesn't matter if a coach is Christian or not," the point is made: "it also doesn't matter if a coach is black or not, so why are we wasting time talking about this?"
Of course, it's also possible that Mazzulla was pointing out that the media has its own narrative that they are interested in talking about - racial politics. It has long been observed that many in sports media are either washed up, or wannabe political journos who haven't made it in that competitive field. Sports writing became the fallback plan, and many are still desperate to make the transition. That desperation has led to an epidemic of "woke sports" hot takes by political activists hoping to make a big enough splash that CNN, MSNBC, or the Washington Post notices them.
If that seems unlikely to you, just note that even after Mazzulla's dismissive rebuke, Goodwill proceeded to write a 1,500 word article on the struggle of black coaches. In other words, this was never an article about Mazzulla, it was never an article about the NBA Finals, it was never an article aimed at those who care about the Celtics, Mavericks, or sports at all.
In case you were tempted to start wondering about it all, BBC’s analyst labeled all doubts about the Hunter Trial as “bizarre.” Bizarre, even though Joe Biden’s son was only charged with the least criminal conduct that the trial evidence proved, eliding right over the millions Hunter raked in from U.S. enemies. Bizarre, even though Trump was charged with the most criminal conduct prosecutors could dream up, using tortured, novel legal theories.
But the BBC can’t see any difference between the two trials...
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