Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr and other NBA coaches like the Spurs’ Gregg Popovich were vocal about their opposition to Donald Trump during the president’s divisive candidacy. The NBA prides itself on inclusiveness — it has players from dozens of countries — and so-called minorities (African Americans) constitute a majority of its players. With the Warriors having won the 2017 NBA title, they’ll likely receive the traditional invitation to be feted at the White House by the president. (They had a grand time visiting with Barack Obama.) But Kerr says he doesn’t yet know if the team will visit Trump. It’s up to the team’s players, he says, but if an invitation does come, Kerr says they’ll decide as a team whether to accept.
Kerr has said he thinks a visit, despite his criticism of the president, “could have really positive ramifications if we did go.” Maybe he means that the NBA champs could rise above politics by going. But is that what they’re supposed to do, stay above the fray, during the Colin Kaerpernick era? NBA Finals MVP Kevin Durant already said he doesn’t want to visit the White House while Trump’s there. “Nah, I won’t do that,” Durant said to ESPN in August. “I don’t respect who’s in office right now. And Steph Curry pretty much called Trump an ass when he reportedly said that he agreed with Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank that Trump was an “asset” — if you remove the “et.”
