Earl Lloyd, the first black player in NBA dies

[otis]

Earl Lloyd, the first black player in the National Basketball Association and a key figure on the only team to win an NBA championship in Syracuse, died Thursday at 86, in Tennessee. The 2003 inductee into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame had been seriously ill since last year.

http://www.syracuse.com/kirst/index...ba_and_syracuse_nationals.html#incart_m-rpt-1

 

[beast of the east]

It's sad that he wasn't feted the way Jackie Robinson was.

Given the NBA cities at the time, and likely lots of bus and train travel, the proximity of fans to the court where catcalls can easily be heard by players, he likely encountered at least as much racism and maybe more than #42. I'd bet there are few NBA players today who'd even recognize his name, no less recite it if asked.

 

[fuchsia]

Drafted ninth by the Capitols, he was one of four blacks to appear in the 1950-51 season in the NBA, and he maintained that his status as the "first" was due to a fluke of the calendar: Chuck Cooper, Nat "Sweetwater" Clifton and Hank DeZonie joined Lloyd that season as the first blacks in the league.

Argument has always existed about who was first... who signed first, who played first, who dressed for a game first, etc.

 

[beast of the east]

Drafted ninth by the Capitols, he was one of four blacks to appear in the 1950-51 season in the NBA, and he maintained that his status as the "first" was due to a fluke of the calendar: Chuck Cooper, Nat "Sweetwater" Clifton and Hank DeZonie joined Lloyd that season as the first blacks in the league.

Argument has always existed about who was first... who signed first, who played first, who dressed for a game first, etc.

I guess by the time Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in a major sport, the NBA which wasn't a huge enterprise back then, more quietly broke the color barrier.