Sports & Politics Intersect: NBA's glass ceiling starts to crack
“There are pushes now for increased gender diversity in the workplace of pretty much every industry in the world. It’s what’s expected. More importantly — it’s what’s right. And yet the NBA should get a pass because some fans are willing to take it easy on us … because we’re 'sports'?” - Pau Gasol, San Antonio Spurs
Becky Hammon became the first woman in any of the four major American sports to interview for a head coaching position when the Milwaukee Bucks brought her in for their vacancy. While she isn’t a frontrunner for the job, her interview is of importance not for the historic implications, but the potential doors it can open up in the future and the discourse that came along with the moment.
Hammon began her coaching career four years ago when Gregg Popovich brought her onto his staff as a behind the bench assistant. The summer of 2015, she led the Spurs to a Summer League title as the head coach and served as the Spurs head coach for a preseason game. From all reports, she’s incredibly respected by her colleagues and all of the players on the roster. She’s even gotten the vote of confidence from her former head coach Sandy Brondello, NBA forward Zach Randolph and Pau Gasol, who wrote about how he found her as a coach for The Players’ Tribune.
The story became a part of the news cycle when the conversation shifted from “Hammon to be interviewed” to “Hammon is skipping the line” and is taking a job from a deserving man.
Hammon has excelled at every point in her amateur and professional career and there is nothing to suggest that it will stop should she get hired for a position in the future. She’s the all-time leading scorer in the Western Athletic Conference for both men and women, she was undrafted in the WNBA, but became an All Star, became an Olympian and is now an assistant coach for one of the most respected organizations in all of sports.
Any discourse about Hammon not being deserving of such opportunities shows a lack of foresight into the future of the league and an eerily convenient case of short-term memory loss. In the summer of 2013 alone, six (white, male) candidates with no NBA playing or NBA head coaching experience were hired in the league. Brad Stevens, one of the coaches hired that summer, had no NBA experience at all, with all of his head coaching experience coming at a mid-Major college. Two of them: Brett Brown and Mike Budenholzer, had served on Popovich’s bench at some point in their careers.
Hammon was interviewed for Milwaukee’s general manager position last summer, and with Pop losing James Borrego and potentially losing Ettore Messina and Ime Udoka, Hammon may be moved to the bench this summer, creating more opportunities for her and other women in the future.
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This week in sports and politics history: Women's professional baseball returns for the first time since World War II with the Silver Bullets
"We have to be tough. We're going to predict the future of women's baseball." - Michele McAnany, Colorado Silver Bullets player
On Mother's Day 1994 — 24 years ago — the Colorado Silver Bullets (then known as the Coors Silver Bullets), an all-female professional baseball club, played their first game in team history against the Northern League All Stars, a team comprised of minor league players. They lost 19-0.
Despite the drubbing, the game would become historically significant; it kicked off a four-year barnstorm across America by the first all-women pro baseball team since the end of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (of “A League of Their Own” fame) in the 1950s. Unlike the AAGPBL, the Silver Bullets played against minor league and semi-pro teams comprised of men.
Originally conceived by former Atlanta Braves executive Bob Hope and sponsored by the Coors Brewing Company (hence the name), the Silver Bullets held tryouts in 11 cities during the winter of 1993. More than 1,300 women tried out. Among those that showed up was Geri Fritz, a ballplayer in the process of transitioning into a woman. Fritz was hoping to use the earnings for being on the team to pay for gender reassignment surgery, but didn't make the final roster.
The Silver Bullets were not intended as a gimmick, a point made repeatedly by their head coach, Hall of Famer Phil Niekro.
"The game is the game," he told the Los Angeles Times in 1994. "I wouldn't be here if this was a sideshow. If they play the game the way it's supposed to be played, you have to take them seriously."
Their legitimacy as a real ball club was cemented on June 11, 1997 — Silver Bullets outfielder Kim Braatz-Voisard charged the mound after the opposing pitcher beaned her and then proceeded to laugh. The incident resulted in a benches-clearing brawl.
The Silver Bullets lasted for four seasons before Coors pulled their funding; though the beer maker claims attendance wasn't a factor, interest in the team dwindled significantly. Unable to find another sponsor, Hope disbanded the team. The Silver Bullets' record in their final season was 23-22, the only winning season in their short history.
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