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And now onto the show.
Dear Bronny,
You don’t know me and I don’t expect you to ever read this. Though I still felt compelled to write, in the slight chance that you might find this drifting at sea some day.
First of all, you’re incredible. An amazing athlete who has played high school, and now Tier 1 college basketball on a really high level. Congrats, that’s no easy feat, and something you should be proud of. What you’ve been able to fight through after your health scare is inspiring, a lesson to teach my own son about breaking through hurdles in pursuit of what you care about and love. You’re also in the unenviable position of being a famous man’s son. And not just any famous man. One of, if not the greatest living athlete. As someone who doesn’t know your father at all, but calls himself a fan, I can only imagine what that feels like for you, his eldest son. I too am an eldest child, and I too know the pressure that comes with that circumstance, and my dad isn’t sitting front row at Drake like yours. In that regard, once again, you’re an inspiration. Everyone knows you conduct yourself with maturity, and despite only being a teenager can somehow uphold the framework that is your family’s legacy. It’s no easy feat and you do it in a way that feels effortless.
Which is why when I ask you this, I ask humbly.
I’m asking you to please consider not playing in the NBA.
Please, let me try and explain.
The NBA, for its fans, is a sacred space. For many reasons. But one of them is that it’s one of the last safe havens in society for meritocracy.
You might not pay attention to shit like this, I sure didn’t when I was your age, but the truth of the matter is the world we live in today is a lot different than the world I lived in when I was your age, a time when your dad was balling out in Akron, and The Simple Life was about to get rolling on TV as one of the first reality shows that made people famous for being related to the famous.
Said another way, we live in a scary place filled with haves and have-nots, to the likes of which we’ve never seen before.
Left and right many of us struggle to make a living, to hold a job, to feel a part of something larger than, or deeper than ourselves, and yet we are forced to bite our tongues as the grinding gears of late-stage Capitalism squeeze down on us from the heavens above, and funnel the spoils to the top 1 percent, throwing the scraps to the rest of us.
Bronny, like you, I grew up in L.A., so I know a lot of rich kids and “kids of,” and though some of them are terrific, some of them, well, aren’t. They can be arrogant and deeply out of touch with everything but their housekeepers.
Just the other day I was in an Uber on the way home and the driver tricked me into paying double by “offering” a route home that was more expensive than the one I had initially agreed on.
I had no idea the suggestion he was making would hike the price up, but it did, and he played it all off like he was trying to help me out and get me home to my family faster.
The reason I’m telling you this is because I wasn’t even upset about it. Almost immediately I understood why the uber driver needed to do this. This is precisely the kind of desperate shit I’m talking about. Drivers, as in human beings — not those weird driverless vehicles with propellors on them, of all stripes and colors, are more frequently than ever being forced to work for ride-share companies or delivery-apps or any other pick your poison Neo-liberal death trap that squeezes the life out of them, forces them into precarious labor, and turns them into lesser human versions of themselves.
Am I not doing the same thing by writing on this platform? Isn’t the feeding frenzy happening on Substack as we speak similar? Writers of all stripes and shapes, famous and un-famous, from every industry imaginable, have rushed to try and monetize their audiences, or make new ones, perhaps because they want to, but also because many of us have to.
The luckiest people alive are the ones that by family fortune or by fate can avoid this. Trust me.
Not to scare you, but in the real world they’re turning us into zombies. Telling us to sell ourselves for their products, and even our very bodies, for likes. The people who have more pretend like they don’t or rub it in your face that they do, albeit ironically or passively.
Weighed down by the pressures of an unfair society that makes it harder and harder for anyone to make bread with any kind of consistency, or planning, we’re all the basketball version of a G League journeyman.
It’s painful.
Alas, the NBA is one of the only places where this isn’t true. Not only is there plenty of cash to go around, but it’s a safe space, where the basketball played is being played by the players who deserve to play it. Their skills, their talent, their gifts, are good enough to make the cut, and prevent those of us who watch it from slitting our throats when we see the eye-popping contracts, because we understand that they do something that no one else on the planet can do.
Sure, there are the occasional exceptions. Thanasis Antetokounmpo comes to mind.
Maybe he’s an NBA player? Or perhaps he’s the NBA equivalent of Jack Osborne? It’s hard to say, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Thanasis Antetokounmpo play before, and it’s not like I don’t watch Bucks games. The point is that the nepotism play with Giannis’ little brother is going to look subtle in comparison to how it might look with your NBA intervention.
I’m really not trying to scare you.
You might make the NBA because you deserve it, and I’m definitely rooting for it, but if you’re not good enough, they won’t tell you to your face, and I’m afraid they’ll never kick you out.
What that might do to you, and the sport, scares me.
Plus, it’s also kinda just a bad look. You don’t want to be the player who is in the league because his dad is Lebron.
Trust me, I’ve been in that situation before. I’ve experienced what it feels like to be less talented than people around me, and yet still find a home because of money or some kind of clout-related benefit that gave me an opportunity over someone else who deserved it more than I did, just because.
It’s a weird feeling. Really weird.
You’re young and you’re going to do what you need to do, but what would be really dope, honestly, is if you looked deep into your heart and asked yourself this question:
Am I really better than the players around me? Do I really deserve to be here?
If the answer is yes, congrats, but if the answer is no, and you decide to step aside to make space for someone who deserves it more than you, that would truly be something to root for.
Thank you, if you enjoyed this piece, you can become a paid subscriber or tip. Till next time.
— Allen
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