NBA officials subconsciously racist? The controversy explained...

Right now the NBA is on the defensive and fighting back at all the coverage surrounding the new (yet-to-be-peer-reviewed) study by two economists that claims a statistically significant own-race bias on the part of officials, a slight effect that the authors suppose is operating at a subconscious level.

The idea is offensive to one and all citizens of Planet Basketball, or at least everybody in NBA Nation. It can't be so, the NBA is a utopia of interracial harmony, it's Stockton to Malone and everybody lives happily ever after.

Of course, professional sports is anything but innocent. Shoeless Joe, anybody? Or what about all that stuff about match fixing that brought professional soccer to its knees in Italy?? That was just within the past year or so. Come on, people, even Jake LaMotta only got a title shot after taking a dive! And it's not like we hear about this every time it happens. There would be no reason to do it unless these people got a way with it a lot too.

Perhaps for the kiddies I am still being too vague. Fine, let's get literal. What is the real explanation for the apparent race bias? Points. Shaving. That's right. The officials are in on it and maybe the league executives too, judging from the vociferous defense they're providing. It looks like race bias because the winning teams, the ones that need their points shaved, just happen to be a bit more black, and at certain points of the game some officials, and there's more white ones in on it (and I watch enough Sopranos not to be surprised, and I saw Casino too), these guys are working the numbers. It sounds crazy, but given the sheer volume of sports betting in society, it's really hard to see how such cheating could ever be avoided.

Don't believe me? Wait until the report's authors wind up with cement boots in the vicinity of the Meadowlands.