Thursday, March 10, 2011

Jalen Rose: "Uncle Toms" at Duke

Jalen Rose said he felt like all the black players at Duke were "Uncle Toms." (His words, folks).

The interview.

My response, on the radio yesterday.

By the way, some facts:

Duke tuition + room/board: $52,000 6,400 Undergrads
African-American 10.3%
Basketball team graduation rate: 90%

Michigan tuition + room/board: out of state $49,000 (in state: $21,000)
51,000 Undergrads
African American 5.8%
Basketball team graduation rate: 44%

SNAP! Duke has far more African-American students, as a proportion of the student body. Tuition/costs are roughly the same. And Duke recruits students who have some chance of graduating. Michigan recruits some guys like Jalen Rose, who left early and had a fine NBA career. But they also recruit a lot of guys who take fake classes and are simply exploited as basketball cannon fodder. So, yes, it may be true that Duke recruits a different sort of player, the sort who has a chance of graduating with a degree. But I think it's more likely that Duke players are told they MUST focus on graduating, and that they have to work. Michigan players can just hope to have a career shooting off their mouths...like Jalen Rose.

I think Duke wins... AGAIN. Gosh it sucks to be you, Jalen!

(To be fair, the fab Five were equal opportunity losers. UNC kicked their ass for the 1993 championship, after Chris Webber did some sort of "travelling / call time out we don't have" dance move at mid-court. So it wasn't like the Fab Five only lost to Duke. Some video, to help you remember.)

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Duke still sucks

Mungowitz said...

Anon: Exactly. EX.ACT. LY. Why bring race into it?

When UNC was beating Dook like a rug last week, sure, I was hootin' an' hollerin'. Duke haters are welcome to hate on the game.

But why hate the black players? Just hate the whole game.

Nicholas said...

Hate to bring a little social science into this, but I assume you're aware that U of M had to change its admissions policy in the middle of last decade? My suspicion is that the numbers when Rose was looking around at colleges (and thus formed his assumptions) would be very different.

John Thacker said...

Most people hate our white players, and then say that they really didn't mind Grant Hill or Carrawell or some other black player on the team. Hating the black guys is relatively new.

Gerardo said...

Rose went to Michigan because that's where Juwan Howard went.

Even so, Michigan had notorious race issues throughout the 1980s. Wouldn't be hard to find if you google it, as it was all over the national news for a spell. Hard to believe Rose was thinking much beyond the ballers when he made his choice.

John Covil said...

My only racial analysis of Duke basketball is that they recruit the ugliest white guys on the planet. And I say that as an ugly white guy.