The NBA has featured significantly more Black players than Whites for decades. A new study, however, finds Blacks are more likely to exit the league earlier than their White teammates. Researchers from Ohio State University say that if an African-American player and Caucasian player have the exact same stats, the Black player has a 30-percent higher chance of leaving the NBA altogether in any given season.
Study authors explain these findings are mostly based on bench players — those averaging less than 20 minutes per game. This is due to the fact that bench players make up the majority of the NBA.
Troublingly, lead study author Davon Norris, a doctoral student in sociology at OSU, says his work makes a strong case that Black players are still dealing with discrimination in the modern NBA. For reference, African-Americans currently make up roughly 70 to 75 percent of NBA players.
“If there is going to be anywhere in America where you would expect there wouldn’t be racial disparities, it would be the NBA,” Norris says in a university release. “But even here we find there is an advantage to being White for most.”
Regarding purely raw data on career length, both races generally leave the NBA at similar rates. However, co-author Corey Moss-Pech, a PhD graduate of Ohio State, says that all changes once you consider on court performance.
“We see the effects when we account for performance,” explains Moss-Pech, who is now a postdoctoral research fellow in sociology at the University of Michigan. “Black players tend to be better than White players, according to the data. They should have longer careers, but they don’t.”
