The NBA’s “College Rule” was made for Black Players
Before the NBA’s heyday of the 1990s, the league was very strict. They did not allow any players into the league that had previous issues with the law. Also, they did not allow any player under the age of 22 to sign a contract with one of their teams. In short, the NBA was doing all that they could from consisting of more black players than of any other race. But, when a rival league, the ABA was willing to allow these players, the NBA stepped things up.
Despite the league stepping up and competing for players, they still held no torch to the ABA, which allowed players to enter the league straight out of high school. When the ABA merged into the NBA, in 1976, the NBA began to allow high school graduates into the NBA. Even with the change in rules, there was only one player between 1976 and 1995 to do so. Kevin Garnett would break this tradition of going to college when he joined the league straight from high school.
Garnett would go on to have a successful rookie season. After watching the success of Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant followed his trend and he joined the league following his senior year of high school. When Kobe rose to become one of the biggest stars in the NBA, the floodgates opened and it became almost a tradition for players to enter the league out of high school. Some saw this as a good thing, but the NBA became known as the league of thugs by the year 2000.
There were times between 2000 and 2002 when the NBA considered raising the age to enter the league. But, the draft class of 2003 was headlined by high school phenom, LeBron James. He picked up where Kobe Bryant left off and became the face of the league before he had even led his team to the playoffs. Even with the success of LeBron James, or in spite of his success, the owners of NBA teams voted to force players into waiting one year before entering the NBA.
The only players to ever come from high school and straight into the NBA are black players and they usually end up becoming successful. By the year 2005, LeBron James could have retired and lived off of the money he made through basketball without ever holding another job. The same remains true for Kobe Bryant, who could have retired before he even turned 20 years old. High school phenoms were entering the NBA and becoming millionaires before they were even 20. The NBA is full of young, black, millionaires and there are some people that hate this.
That is the reason that ESPN places a larger emphasis on March Madness than the NBA Playoffs. After all, which one is most important, the amateurs playing for an amateur championship, or professional basketball players playing for a professional basketball world championship? But, because of the fact that the league is full of black players and college gives many white players a chance to shine, it receives more attention. Now that players that would have gone straight to the NBA are beginning to take that shine away from white players, they are trying to reverse the rule that a NBA player has to be at least 19 to play in the league.
