The NBA Draft Limit: You Might Be Overstating the Case There, Sir.

As Sean Deveney pointed out earlier, a cursory survey of the ten best players in these Finals makes a case against any kind of age limit. Mike DeCourcy sees otherwise, but I’ve got to side with Sean on this one.
↵
↵Or maybe I’m just swayed by the fact that, if Congressman Steve Cohen has his way, soon this controversial rule might have to defend itself against questions from important elected officials. From The New York Times ↵↵⇥“It’s a vestige of slavery,” Cohen said Wednesday in a phone interview, noting that most of the players affected by the rule are African-American. “Not like the slavery of 150 years ago, but it’s a restraint on a person’s freedoms and liberties.”
↵⇥
↵⇥Cohen said he was dismayed to hear that N.B.A. Commissioner David Stern was hoping to extend the age limit to 20. He added that his office was in the process of looking into the legalities of the limit and that a hearing and legislation were possible. He said the issue would fall under the jurisdiction of the House’s Judiciary Committee. ↵↵I don’t quite get what kind of slavery Cohen is referring to, if not the slavery of 150 years ago. But his basic point stands: The age limit disproportionately affects African-Americans who could use the money.
↵
↵It’s a stretch, and rather patronizing, for Cohen to say that “They’re forced to go to school when they have no desire or interest in going to school,” or point to Thaddeus Young as someone who should’ve been able to make the jump because “I don’t think he’s going to be an engineer. It’s just kind of a mockery.” For the record, Young was a very good student who, had he not been a gifted athlete, would likely have gotten a college degree.
↵
↵However, this is pretty much par for the course with Cohen, who is from the Joe Biden school of well-meaning, overheated crusades for social justice. What’s really interesting to me is that the age limit could come before Congress framed as a racial issue, even a case of soft discrimination. It’s easy for Stern’s people to defend it as important for personal development, or the sanctity of the league, or whatever. And thus far, the retort to any socio-economic take on it has been “wait a year.”
↵
↵Bringing race into the argument, though, makes accusations of unfairness a lot harder to deflect. Is the age limit racist? Even if the answer isn’t a definitive “yes,” the league might have to prove “no beyond a reasonable doubt” to not see this whole conversation blown wide open again.↵