[GronounoursParticipant]

 

I’m sure everyone is wondering what this title means, and I’m sure many of you will find this threat irrelevant and silly; anyway.

 

The USA is seen as a country for winners: when you deserved it, when you work hard, you can get to the top and once there, everyone respects your success and your money and leaves you in peace : you don’t owe anything to anyone. If you’re a looser, though, if you don’t toil enough, then you’ll remain at (or fall to) the bottom. You cannot expect others to bail you out, it’s up to you. All this in the name of individual liberty and free market.

 

Europe has another image. If you’re a winner, you’re supposed to pay heavy taxes to help the loosers. There’s no such thing as a ‘self-made’ man : if you made it to the top, it’s also because others, before and around you, have favored your success. Loosers, in turn, can be loosers because of bad luck, which can happen to anyone ; they should not be left to their own devices.

 

These outlooks are of course caricatural. In fact, in the US, social mobility is now lower than in most European countries: if you’re born poor, then you’ll probably die poor, and ‘merit’ has nothing to do with it. And free market is just a joke nowadays. Europe, for its part, is heading for the Anglo-Saxon ‘laissez-faire’: the old welfare state is considered as outdated by many people.

But anyway, that’s how both region are perceived. ‘Socialism’ is a terrible word in the US, not so much so in Europe. America is open and young, Europe is closed and old.

 

But when you see American basket-ball, you wonder how on earth such a ‘socialist’, closed system happened to develop in the US. In Europe, the richest teams get the best players and that’s it. If your team hasn’t got a lot of money to spend, it will never get any decent player. But if a Arab sheik chooses randomly to buy your team, then you can make your way to the top in a few years. This means that the system is open and exclusively based on money. It’s not the case in the NBA. A Russian oligarch cannot purchase the tiny squad of Glenrock, Wyoming, hire LeBron and Howard and get a ring. No sir, you have to play by the rules and ask Mr Stern first.

 

The draft system itself is super-socialist: if you’re bad, if you loose game after the game, you’ll have the right to eat first and to pick out your meal. That’s frankly christian: ‘poor thing, look at you, come here and I’ll wash your feet !’ It’s worse than that: when you’re weak, you have the moral right to be deliberately awful to be served first. Try to dump your job voluntarily to arouse mercy: I don’t think anyone will rush at you shouting ‘poor thing, are you okay?’. You’ll be considered as a shamless lazy person and if you get serioulsy ill, you may well end up dying under a bridge.

 

It’s obvious that this ‘socialist’ NBA is socialist because, in the end, it’s more marketable this way. Look at the Bobcats or the Wizards: they are pitiful, fans could become bored and forget  their team. The NBA could be divided into some ‘aristocratic’ teams and a bunch of underdogs (exactly like American society); that would be damned boring, though. But hey, maybe the Bobcats or the Wizards will land Davis in a couple of month, and maybe Muhammad next year: that would be thrilling, definitely.

 

It’s a bit sad. You can attend to the poor/loosers if in doing so you’ll enjoy a great show. Helping bad NBA teams is just great; helping poor people is booooooring.

 

C’est tout.

 

 

[B FreeParticipant]

 you mad bro?

[GronounoursParticipant]

Maybe, I don’t know. The stark contrast between the draft system and the American society has always puzzled me. I’m from Belgium, I’ve never been to the US, I just wanted to know how American people see what seems so discrepant to me. 

[thartle8Participant]

 The American Major League Baseball system is similar to society if you want to word as more of a free-market society.  The Yankees are known to buy baseball and due to no salary cap, they can continue to do so.  This is completely unfair to teams such as the Pirates who, because they were started in a bad location with a poor team, have nearly no chance to win a championship.  The NBA draft system makes the league more fair and comes down to style and decisions more than money.

[butidonthavemoney]

The NBA isn’t supposed to mirror American politics. Why the hell should it? The NBA would be boring if only one or two teams had all the top talent. Consequently, many people would stop watching and everybody involved would lose money — including the big-market teams. You said yourself that it’s more marketable to offer hope and excitement to the struggling teams by giving them higher draft picks. Keep the fans interested and fuel the idea that their home team can be competitive in the future. If the folks in Charlotte only go to the Time Warner Cable Arena to see the Lakers or Knicks beat the Bobcats by 65 points a handful of times every year, then the team wouldn’t ever have enough money to become relevant again.

[GronounoursParticipant]

I agree with you. I’m not saying the draft is a bad system (it’s great, actually), but it would be nice to realize that a bit of sympathy and help could do wonders for people too, not only for BB teams.

 

"The NBA isn’t supposed to mirror American politics.": it could mirror American society.Why is it that American people seem (I insist on "seem") to accept as normal big and widening inequalities between human beings, while at the seam time accepting as normal a small and closing gaps between NBA teams? The underlying philosophy is the same: or you think that you have to make it on you own, or you think that everyone should get a helpful hand when needed.

[M-DYMESParticipant]

I think having a lotto system in the draft makes this the most non-socialist sport in terms of the draft.  Salary caps are partially socialistic but they are necessary b/c otherwise you have the big market teams constantly being the only contenders.

[Anton123Participant]

 I actually found the read very interesting.

I mean Europe does have the best football league in the world (I’m talkin’ bout the football where people play with their feet). And the football league does function strictly on money. The rich teams play other rich teams in their top division and the poor teams play the poor teams in their divisions. If some cool guy buys a poor team and raises it – it gets to a better division. There are always surprise teams too (this year there’s a team from Cyprus in the quater-finals)

The league’s are still very interesting and very competetive, actually they have mostly somewhat equal talents playing each other, so there are no silly games like the Bobcats playing the Thunder. Right now Barcelona seems to be kind of dominating, but that will stop once some of their player’s production falls and who knows, they haven’t won the champion’s league yet..

 

[NbanflguyParticipant]

uhh what?

[butidonthavemoney]

"’The NBA isn’t supposed to mirror American politics.’: it could mirror American society.Why is it that American people seem (I insist on "seem") to accept as normal big and widening inequalities between human beings, while at the seam time accepting as normal a small and closing gaps between NBA teams? The underlying philosophy is the same: or you think that you have to make it on you own, or you think that everyone should get a helpful hand when needed."

I’m sorry, I completely misunderstood the point of your post. It took a second read for me to get where you were coming from.

Many Americans don’t believe on widening the gap that you mentioned, though this is a very interesting analogy. I’d love to hear a conservative’s view on the matter.

[apb540Participant]

Yea I’m a little confused on what the issue being brought up is.  Every American sport rewards bad teams with high draft picks, and I think that is based off logic, not the idea of being socialist. 

[M-DYMESParticipant]

^^^

Exactly.  Socialism and Communism are far from these "evil" ideologies.  There are parts of them that are very logical and superior to capitalism.  The problem exists when systems refuse to place limits on these ideologies and expand by including ideals of the alternative systesm.  No one point of view is perfect.  Socialism, communism, and capitalism all have their pros and cons. 

[Anton123Participant]

 If you dig deep, there is no denying that socialism is based on logic too lol.

[M-DYMESParticipant]

^^^

B/c our previously gov’t officials and congressional body pounded it into our psyches that they are "evil".  If you did not fully oppose communism, u were labeled a communist and supporter of the red army.  During the Cold War era, this was used as a tactic to increase patriotism and help fund and support the war.

[butidonthavemoney]

I think he wants to know why socialist themes are accepted by just about everyone in American sports, but are considered "evil" in American politics.

Edit: I guess M-DYMES and myself are on the same page.

[Anton123Participant]

 Communism is basically utopian, there is nothing bad in a utopia, but it is impossible

Fair socialism is quite impossible too, as proved by China and the USSR (of which I know quite a lot, being russian). Basically socialism and communism are the exact opposite of evil, they just don’t seem to work on the scale of a country. They do seem to work on the scale of a basketball league though

[GronounoursParticipant]

 I’m sorry if my post isn’t too clear. English is obviously not my mother tongue, and the efforts I make to write more or less correctly distract me from the meaning of what I’m writing.

So I don’t think the draft system is bad. I’m saying that if it were applied to the rest of society, American people would think "oh my God, this is socialism". And I do believe they would be kind of right.

Think of it: young players cannot chose their team: the more talented and hard working you are, the worse the team that chooses you. What kind of reward is that? I remember that Rubio was vilified because he didn’t want to go to Minnesota. I was thinking "well, I wouldn’t go either, what’s wrong with that? Isn’t America the land of freedom? Do you have to play for a lousy team just because you’re good?".

 

[M-DYMESParticipant]

Thats b/c communism and socialism would work on a smaller field of 30 entities when each entity still will have a drive to become stronger and not be willing to just be part of a surviving system.  A huge problem with commuism is that bottom-feeders gain support from the gov’t to survive with stability.  But, for some, that diminishes any drive they had to work hard because they know that regardless of if they do or not, they can be dependent on the system.  

In sports, every team is trying to win the title (or ideally, sometimes I question it in baseball lol).  The players and teams are not just trying to make money (again, ideally).  There is something that pushes the overwhelming majority to strive for success.  And those who are willing to just live off being in the NBA or corresponding league, that does not upset those trying to win.  They will not get upset that they are not giving 110% towards winning.  They do not feel cheated by weak teams who may treat it as a business.  

[apb540Participant]

To answer your question NoMoney, I would say socialist themes in sports are accepted because it makes the sport better as a whole.  Look at the Colts; they are about to go from worst to playoff contender because they got a high pick.  Would it of made sense for a decent team, say the Eagles, to get that top pick? no.  The same can go for the NBA; the Cavs deserved Kyrie Irving a lot more than the Mavericks.

I’m all for the idea of ‘best man wins’ in real life, but to make sports even you have to be "socialist."

[WinterSoldierParticipant]

 Well I will say the NBA is not communist or socialist the tickets are very high priced and competitive to there market also they sell merchantdize all over the world, they also are paid higher and higher salaries which teams compete for so I would agree the draft and revenue sharing might be somewhat socialist (but even that can be somewhat capitalist in the sense that better competition makes the overall product more valuable) but overall I would say it’s pretty much a capitalistic business IMO.

[DurantsWingspan]

The problem in America is that we are so brainwashed to believe that America can never be wrong. Their are so many unnessesary stupid things on television that our citizens deem to be important. Our citizens, for the most part, never form their own point of view, but rather chose which point of view to believe that already exists. The problem is that no one really knows there is a problem. Most people think their is no problem which the way our country is being ran or believe that there is nothing they can do to change it. For people like me who know there is something wrong and know that people can change it, grow increasingly tired of attempting when you are the only person around you who realizes it, and reluctlantly kind of give up. And so the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer, and that is America.

[DurantsWingspan]

Socialism, if run correctly without greed, would work amazing. The thing is that capitalism, if run correctly without greed, would work amazing as well. The thing is I doubt humans will ever be able to have a Government that is run correctly without greed. There is always a secret person/persons who is REALLY in charge, and the Government always runs in the greedy direction of their wants and needs.

[B FreeParticipant]

 That is what freeagency is for if you work hard and are good you have the freedom to choose any team you want.

[delfamParticipant]

 The NBA needs a relegation system like in Europe so we don’t have to watch the Bobcats next year.

[Author]

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