Raptors Players as Hired Help

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Matt Thomas, a sharp shooter who could have reduced the 
Raptors deficit.

Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE) owns Toronto Raptors and hires staff to oversee the basketball team. It also hires players, guys in contact with water, in the swimming pool.

This division of labour creates inequality because top tier staff members are not hired help, players are. Hired help usually has speed dial on the mute button. Players see and feel things because they are in the swimming pool, but cannot cry for help.

Top tier staff like coaches don’t even know the water’s temperature because they just dip a foot and they are out of the water, but make decisions that negatively affect players, the hired help.

It can be argued that players are not that voiceless. They have agents watching their back and Michelle Roberts, Executive Director of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), speaks for them.

True, but they take care of numbers, stats, contracts written in legalese and ever present injuries. However, contracts and NBPA are not in the water, sometimes swimming against the tide, which is what happened when Toronto Raptors played Boston Celtics.

Stanley Johnson, Masai Ujiri signed him B4 Kawhi
Leonard tried the Clippers jersey.

Players are aggrieved and sports media should not even think of asking them why they are not happy the way Nick Nurse handled the whole thing. Players are hired help and their fingers are on the mute button.

MLSE does not care about players. That is why owners gave Nick Nurse an extension. Winning the 2019 Championship is what prompted MLSE to renew his contract. MLSE is not interested in why he intentionally sabotaged the Raptors/Celtics series. A great injustice is Pascal Siakam taking the blame for the loss, and not the coach, the perpetrator.

Nurse is not hired help. That is why he got an extension and other powers he poached from other Raptors’ executives. Players are not blind. They can see. They feel, but they cannot speak because they are hired help. They’ll think about it though when it’s time to decide whether to stay in Toronto or fly away.

It’s all water under the bridge because Nurse got what he wanted. MLSE is happy with it. How players feel is not important. The team’s future is in Nurse’s hands, not players. After all, they are just hired help.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.    

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