Tag: jacob blake

Bucks show what it means to use platform for change

What I’m Hearing: USA TODAY Sports’ Mark Medina was on site when the Milwaukee Bucks made the decision to boycott their Game 5 matchup against the Magic and details the experience.

What I’m Hearing: USA TODAY Sports’ Mark Medina was on site when the Milwaukee Bucks made the decision to boycott their Game 5 matchup against the Magic and details the experience.

Breaking: Washington to postpone Thursday’s scrimmage to protest shooting of Jacob Blake

Washington is joining a number of sporting teams in boycotting over the shooting of Jacob Blake.

It was reported by NBC Sports Washington’s JP Finlay on Wednesday night that the Washington Football Team would postpone their practice on Thursday — which was set to be a scrimmage taking place at FedEx Field — until further notice.

The postponement comes in the wake of the shooting of Jacob Blake in Wisconsin, which led a number of sports leagues to halt operations in order to reflect and find how to use their platforms to incite change.

The first domino fell on Wednesday afternoon when the Milwaukee Bucks players boycotted their Game 5 NBA Playoff game against the Orlando Magic, refusing to play. Since then, a number of other teams and sporting leagues have joined in the boycott, demanding change.

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Bucks stand united: ‘Our focus can not be on basketball’

SportsPulse: Following their boycott of Game 5, the Milwaukee Bucks stood united in front of the media and explained why, in the aftermath of the Jacob Blake shooting, now is not the time for basketball.

SportsPulse: Following their boycott of Game 5, the Milwaukee Bucks stood united in front of the media and explained why, in the aftermath of the Jacob Blake shooting, now is not the time for basketball.

Seahawks coach Pete Carroll: ‘It’s the season of protests’

Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll called 2020 “the season of protests” and will continue to educate his players on justice and equality.

The Seattle Seahawks were in the middle of their mock game Wednesday afternoon when the news broke that the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks did not take the court ahead of their playoff game against the Orlando Magic in protest of the recent shooting of Jacob Blake.

Coach Pete Carroll was asked after the scrimmage whether or not it was likely the Seahawks or any other NFL team would do the same this season.

“You know, anything is possible,” Carroll said. “I mentioned to the players this is the year – it’s the protest season. It’s the season of protests.”

“So we’ll handle ourselves as we do and but this is a protest that doesn’t have an end to it until all the problems go away and we solves the issues and stuff,” Carroll explained. “So we are going to do our part and continue to work to stay actively involved and continue to stay in touch with the situations that are going on by staying on the topics.

“And with it, just in hopes that we can be there to help and support where we can.”

The Seahawks have an off day on Thursday before resuming practice Friday afternoon.

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NBA postpones all games Wednesday after teams including Thunder boycott

After the Bucks, Magic, Thunder and Rockets boycotted their games to protest the response the shooting of Jacob Blake, the NBA announced all games Wednesday are postponed.

The Milwaukee Bucks boycotted Game 5 of their series against the Orlando Magic after the shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man, in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

The Magic followed suit, also boycotting the game.

Not long after, The Athletic’s Shams Charania reported that the Oklahoma City Thunder and Houston Rockets had also decided to boycott their game.

Then, Charania tweeted that the Los Angeles Lakers and Portland Trail Blazers would not play either.

Minutes later, he reported that the NBA had decided to postpone all games Wednesday as the league and players decide what to do.

NBA players in the bubble will meet Wednesday night to discuss further steps, according to Charania.

With the announcement of the postponement, there officially will not be any forfeits from the players’ decisions Wednesday.

Blake was shot in the back seven times by a police officer on Sunday as he opened the door to his car. He survived but is paralyzed, the family’s attorney told CBS News.

Police had reportedly been called for a domestic incident. Blake’s family said Blake had gotten out of his car to try to break up the fight, according to ABC Chicago. Video shows police following him with their guns out as he walked back to his car, and after Blake opened the door, he was shot several times.

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Bucks, Magic boycott playoff game in protest; Celts, Raps may be next

The Boston Celtics and Toronto Raptors may both follow the Milwaukee Bucks and Orlando Magic in canceling playoff games in protest over the shooting of Jacob Blake.

The Milwaukee Bucks and Orlando Magic have become the first teams in NBA history to cancel an entire game in protest, and the Boston Celtics and Toronto Raptors might not be far behind them.

Tuesday evening, players from the Celtics and Raptors met to discuss potential responses to the shooting of Jacob Blake by Kenosha, Wisconsin police, putting a boycott of Game 1 of their second-round playoff series on the table.

On Wednesday, the Bucks beat them to it.

Instead of playing their Game 5 of their respective first-round series, Milwaukee decided to boycott the game, which Bucks guard George Hill confirmed with The Undefeated’s Marc Spears.

“We’re tired of the killings and the injustice,” said Hill, whose teammate Sterling Brown experienced racial profiling and police brutality at the hands of local officers in nearby Milwaukee.

While the Magic seemed unsupportive of the move according to The Athletic’s Shams Charania, the Bucks leaned into it, even attempting to reach the Attorney General of Wisconsin from the locker room to underscore their point.

Soon afterwards, the Portland Trail Blazers and Los Angeles Lakers and the Houston Rockets and Oklahoma City Thunder decided to join them, with all games scheduled for August 26th postponed by the NBA.

With the Celtics and Raptors poised to pick up the torch tomorrow evening, it seems likely that game may well be boycotted by the players from those teams as well.

Between the emotional distress, anger, and working their way through what comes next while they are navigating postseason aspirations, COVID-19, and being away from family, friends, and similarly-affected communities back home, NBA players across the league have much to think about.

Let’s do our best to support them in whatever they decide in this terrible and historic moment, the first major U.S. sport to see a games canceled in protest.

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Rockets, Thunder boycott Game 5 in wake of Jacob Blake shooting

The decision by Houston and Oklahoma City to boycott Game 5 followed a similar choice earlier in the afternoon by the Milwaukee Bucks.

Players on the Houston Rockets and Oklahoma City Thunder jointly decided not to play Wednesday’s Game 5 of their first-round series in the NBA playoffs, as first reported by Shams Charania of The Athletic.

The decision follows a choice by the Milwaukee Bucks to boycott Game 5 of their series against the Orlando Magic over the shooting of Jacob Blake, which occurred in the greater Milwaukee area.

Blake, a 29-year-old Black man who lives in Kenosha, Wisconsin, was shot multiple times in the back by police officers Sunday while he was leaning into an SUV. Police were responding to a domestic dispute call.

Blake is in stable condition, paralyzed from the waist down, according to his father and Ben Crump, the family’s attorney. Blake was unarmed. Three of his six children were in the car when the shots were fired.

The outrage over shooting of Blake comes approximately three months after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis and an associated wave of protests in early June, which had some NBA players questioning whether to restart the 2019-20 season at all — out of fear that it could distract from the “Black Lives Matter” movement.

As for the Rockets and Thunder, whose series remains deadlocked at two games apiece, it is unclear when it will resume. The mutual decision to boycott came after All-Star guards and NBA veterans Russell Westbrook and Chris Paul met in a back hallway at the Disney World arena site, seemingly as the lead representative for each of their teams.

The NBA issued a statement late Wednesday saying that the games would be rescheduled, though a new date has yet to be released.

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Report: Thunder, Rockets to boycott Game 5 in protest alongside Bucks, Magic

The Thunder and Rockets will reportedly follow the lead of the Bucks and Magic and boycott Game 5 after the shooting of Jacob Blake.

The Oklahoma City Thunder and Houston Rockets will reportedly follow the lead of the Milwaukee Bucks and Orlando Magic and boycott Game 5, according to The Athletic’s Shams Charania.

The boycotts were prompted by the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man, in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Blake was shot in the back seven times by a police officer on Sunday as he opened the door to his car. He survived but is paralyzed, the family’s attorney told CBS News.

Police had reportedly been called for a domestic incident. Blake’s family said Blake had gotten out of his car to try to break up the fight, according to ABC Chicago. Video shows police following him with their guns out as he walked back to his car, and after Blake opened the door, he was shot several times.

There have been in Kenosha since, and the National Guard was called into the area, according to the Washington Post.

The Thunder were scheduled to hold the usual pregame press conference at 3:45 p.m. Central Time. It was initially postponed 15 minutes and then later canceled.

After Game 4 of the Thunder and Rockets series, Oklahoma City point guard and National Basketball Players Association president Chris Paul brought up Blake in an on-court interview.

“I don’t know, that’s all good and well, I just want to send my prayers out to Jacob Blake and their family,” Paul said.

“The things that we decided to come down here to play for and we said we’re gonna speak on, the social injustice and the things that continue to happen to our people — it’s not right. It’s not right,” he said before pivoting to other issues.

“The win is good, but voting is real. I’m gonna challenge all my NBA guys, other sports guys, let’s try to get our entire teams registered to vote. There’s a lot of stuff going on in the country. Sports, it’s cool, it’s good and well, it’s how we take care of our families, but those are the real issues we gotta start addressing.”

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The NBA world salutes the Milwaukee Bucks for boycott of Game 5

The Milwaukee Bucks boycotted Game 5 of their series with the Magic in response to the police shooting of Jacob Blake.

Over the last few days, NBA players have been talking about what to do in response to the shooting of Jacob Blake — a Wisconsin man who was shot by police eight times and is now paralyzed from the waist down.

On Wednesday, they figured it out. The Milwaukee Bucks chose to boycott game 5 against the Orlando Magic in protest of police brutality.

The game’s tip-off was set for 4:10 p.m. EST. When time came for the game to start, the Bucks refused to leave the locker room. Top NBA executives posted up outside of their locker room, according to reports, before they were eventually told the Bucks weren’t going to play.

It’s unclear what happens next. Normally, when a team fails to appear for a game they forfeit automatically and are fined, per ESPN’s Bobby Marks. But it’s unclear if that will apply to Milwaukee here.

And the Magic aren’t accepting a forfeit.

One thing here is for sure — we haven’t quite seen anything like this in recent years. This is an entire team refusing to play as a means to stand up for what they believe in. We’ve seen protest in sports before, but rarely do we have moments like this.

NBA players applauded the move by the Bucks after getting the news, including LeBron James.

*WARNING: There is some NSFW language included in these tweets*

NBA fans reacted the same way.

Good on the Bucks. This is what taking a stand looks like.

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Ex-Cs Coach Doc Rivers shares powerful words on Jacob Blake shooting

Former Boston Celtics head coach Doc Rivers shared some powerful words on the shooting of Jacob Blake Tuesday evening.

Racism is not an abstract phenomenon for former Boston Celtics Head Coach Doc Rivers; from his days as a player up to the present, it has had a palpable impact on his life, with his home even being burned down at one point over his interracial relationship.

So, when asked by the media about the shooting of Jacob Blake in Wisconsin over the weekend, a Black man who was shot seven times by police in front of his children after breaking up a fight between two women, the now- Los Angeles Clippers Head Coach’s voice cracked with emotion.

“What stands out to me is just watching the Republican convention and they are spewing this fear. All you hear is Donald Trump and all of them talking about fear,” Rivers said after the Clippers’ Game 5 win over the Dallas Mavericks.

“We’re the ones getting killed. We’re the ones getting shot. We’re the ones that are denied to live in certain communities. We’ve been hung. We’ve been shot. All you do is keep hearing about fear.”

“It’s amazing why we keep loving this country, and this country does not love us back,” Rivers added.

“It’s just really so sad. I should just be a coach. I’m so often reminded of my color. It’s just really sad. We’ve got to do better. We have to demand better.”

He then highlighted some concrete ways we can prevent these kinds of incidents, beginning with holding police accountable.

“The training has to change in the police force. The unions have to be taken down in the police force,” Rivers offered. “My dad was a cop. I believe in good cops. We’re not trying to defund the police and take all of their money away. We’re trying to get them to protect us just like they protect everybody else.”

The former Celtics coach encouraged us all to watch the video of Kenosha police shooting Blake as he attempted to go to his vehicle as well.

“When you watch that video, it’s sickening. It’s sickening,” he exclaimed.

“You know his kids were there. How do they ever get that out of their mind? How will those kids ever be normal? If you watch that video, you don’t need to be Black to be outraged. You need to be American and outraged. How dare the Republicans talk about fear? We’re the ones that need to be scared. We’re the ones that have to talk to every Black child. What white father has to give his son a talk about being careful if you get pulled over?”

“It’s just ridiculous. It keeps going. There’s no charges. Breonna Taylor, nothing,” he added.

Rivers also demanded protests be treated the same regardless of who is doing the protesting.

“We protest and they send riot guards. They send people in riot outfits. They go to Michigan with guns and are spitting on cops, and nothing happens,” Rivers observed.

“All we’re asking is you live up to the constitution. That’s all we’re asking for everybody.”

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