On Wednesday, I explained the saga bewitching the Los Angeles Lakers. The extremely short version: D’Angelo Russell recorded Nick Young admitting infidelity and the video got out. Russell’s Lakers teammates froze him out socially, and he later gave one of the most sincere-seeming public apologies in memory.
The reaction to D’Angelo Russell vs. Nick Young shows sports prioritize brotherhood too much
The reaction to the Lakers’ saga reveals that we value one kind of trust over another.
Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports
Much to the chagrin of a number of readers, my explainer took a tone of mild sympathy for Russell, who is 20 years old. Twenty-year-olds are prone to judgment deficits. Insomuch as this incident has impacted Russell’s social and work lives, it was a mistake. His workplace environment places an inordinately high value on trust. Russell broke that, even if accidentally.
Pro sports locker rooms aren’t the only workplaces where trust and confidentiality hold such high value. You’ll find the same environment within police departments, correctional facilities and certain parts of the military. Basically, anywhere coworkers consider themselves a brotherhood. The difference, of course, is that no one’s life is on the line when the Lakers huddle up, despite the ubiquity of war metaphors in sports.
It’s through this prism that Lakers teammates are icing Russell, fans are booing him, Young is passive-aggressively subtweeting him and every NBA player (current or former) asked about it is lashing out at him. Why? Because, in the estimation of these critics, Russell broke the bro code, a nebulous set of unspoken rules not unlike those of baseball. Violations are subjective and as such subject to interpretation.
But it's pretty clear where the loudest voices come down. Marcus Morris claimed he'll never say another word to Russell. Jarrett Jack shook his damn head. Olden Polynice said he would have clocked Russell. Contemptible human Matt Barnes turned it into a Derek Fisher joke invoking the guy code. And, as ESPN reported Wednesday, Russell's own Laker brothers wearing purple and gold refused to sit with him at breakfast after the video leaked.
The players aren’t alone: wide swaths of the media and the general sports fandom have excoriated Russell. There is no use in lamenting such a widely held opinion. Our modern modes of discourse, in fact, put you at risk of excoriation for merely disagreeing with any widely and strongly held opinion. But, as Michel Foucault reasoned, analysis of discourses can tell you much about the relationships and power of those having the discourses, regardless of the topic.
This is illustrative in D’Angelo v. Swaggy. The focus of Russell’s most strident critics has been his violation of trust to a teammate, a friend, a brother. It’s no mistake that commenters mention the bro code and Matt Barnes references the guy code. To many, it’s not about the friend code or the co-worker code. It’s about brotherhood. It’s about other men. It’s about the hierarchy of trust. In that hierarchy, this argument suggests, men come first.
Let’s not forget that there are two trust violations in this saga. Before Russell broke Young’s trust, Young broke his fiancée’s trust. By framing Russell’s mistake as a violation of the bro code, it’s made explicit that protection of the trust between two men is more vital than protecting trust norms between men and women in intimate relationships. Doesn’t that seem retrograde? Isn’t that regrettable old maxim bros before hoes so passé that the philosophy behind it can die, too?
Polynice (a retired journeyman) argued that the nature of sport requires full trust among teammates. To build camaraderie and achieve success, all participants must value trust in each other over trust with anyone else. That puts the lie to anyone who believes in this code, yet says that family comes first. If you must hold your teammates within a tighter trust circle than your partner, then in fact your family does not come first. Something has to give. Based on the reactions from the NBA community and even fans who have less formal brotherhoods of friends and the like, not too many people really believe that families come first, at least not when it comes to trust.
When we talk about a bro code that values trust in a male coworker or friend more than trust in an intimate partner, we're really talking about belief in male exceptionalism. We're suggesting that a man's trust has more inherent value than that of a woman, regardless of the relationships involved.
This isn’t to say you are sexist or anti-feminist if you are viscerally angry about D’Angelo Russell. It simply shows how much introspection and self-analysis sports and society still must do.
* * *
Be sure to subscribe to SB Nation’s YouTube channel for highlight videos, features, analysis and more
