Newspaper Page Text
The Maroon
Page 9
April 1997/
'
Juwan Howard (left) is just one of the many Black athletes represented by David Falk
Representing Our Athletes:
Blacks Must Be Agents of Change
by kyle j. martin
sports editor
portions. Within the covertly racist,
exploitive entity that is professional
athletics, the prognosis for black sports
agents has just gotten worse: Their
greatest ally, their supposed ace-in-the-
hole, the black athlete, is really a
double agent who denounces "The
System" on one end, then goes out and
does his fair share in perpetuating it
on the other.
If, as the Center for the Study of Sport
in Society at Northeastern University
And don't forget the now-famous Leigh
Steinberg, who, in addition to serving as
the agent-model for the box office block
buster Jerry Maguire, will undoubtedly
have the NFL covered as he reaps the ben
efits of having Super Bowl XXXI MVP
Desmond Howard as a client.
So what gives here? Obviously not our
athletes, but WHY? For a plethora of rea
sons, but mainly because in general we as
black folk don't trust each other — espe
cially when it comes to handling our
reports, Black athletes make up 82 percent
of the players in the NBA, 68 percent of
those in the NFL, and 19 percent of the to
tal in Major League Baseball, there should
be, statistically speaking, a viable pool of
clients for black agents to represent. But is
there? Not really, when one takes a closer
look at the situation. Not when big-name
white attorneys like David Falk go out and
coral marquee names like Jordan, Ewing,
Iverson, Mourning, and Juwan Howard for
their ever-expanding stable of black ath
letes and then simply use the clout of these
superstar clients to maintain a stranglehold
on much of the NBA's incoming talent.
t's been said too
many times that if
you don't want
black folk to know
something, you'd
better put it in
print. That's why
it's funny that
with regards to black athletes being
represented by black agents, the writ
ing on the wall has been so blatantly
clear and so brutally honest. For the
black sports agent, the attempt to rep
resent black athletes has become an
agon of ridiculously frustrating pro
money, a sickness that is only serving
to further erode our already tenuous
progress in the black community to
wards self-sufficiency and eventual
self-empowerment. This tendency is
painfully evident in sports, as the
black athlete has somehow bought
into the notion that choosing a white
agent is the way to go if you want to
"get yours." I'ma go with a Falk, or a
Steinberg, or some other bigwig white
agent, then kick back and watch those
teams "show me 'da money."
We love talking about bucking the
system, but why haven't we given our
own agents a chance to help us do this?
Considering all the yang that
Georgetown's Men's Basketball coach
John Thompson talks in challenging
conventions when he speaks out
against the NCAA's racism towards
black coaches and black student-ath
letes, why is it that he has David Falk
as his attorney? Or Tiger Woods, who,
though he breaks his black heritage
down to only a small percentage, was
black enough to know to go with white
Superagent Hughes Norton when he
hit the pro ranks this past summer?
■ I ey, fellas, black agents have
I I got skillz" too — after all it
J. JLwas the brother duo of Carl
and Kevin Poston who got the Or
lando Magic's Anferneee Hardaway
that fat (Pre-Rookie Salary Cap) con
tract for 13 years at $68 million. And
what about Atlana-based attorney R.
David Ware, who was key in getting
Detroit Lions running back Barry
Sanders the highest non-quarterback
contract in the NFL in 1989? Black ath
letes need to follow through with their
complaints against the system and fol
low in the footsteps of the Washing
ton Bullets' Chris Webber and multi
sport athlete Deion Sanders by com
mitting themselves to being repre
sented by a black agent.
It's about time we get our black
agents into the game by making them
a big part of an offense designed to
score big points against a hostile main
stream opposition. This may be our
only shot in changing the momentum
of the Representation Game, a contest
in which our athletes truly have a
chance to be "’Da Man" by providing
some much-needed assists worth two
points: One for our black agents and
one for our community.