[DanEboyParticipant]

I saw a post on here today about Marquez Haynes dunking and it reminded me of a guy that he was probably named after- Marques Haynes.

4 days ago today marked the 62nd anniversary of one of the most significant sporting events in history, one that most people don’t know about. Everyone knows the influence that Jackie Robinson and Jessie Owens had on their respective sports but few realize the impact the Harlem Globetrotters had on theirs.

The Harlem Globetrotters were founded in Chicago in the early ’20’s by a fellow named Abe Saperstein. Abe was a 5’5 jewish immigrant who starred in 3 sports in high school, one of which was basketball. Abe went on to the University of Illinois in Champaign but had to leave after one year because the family couldn’t afford to keep him there. He became the athletic director of Wendell Phillips High School and that is where he would meet the 5 guys that he would turn into The Harlem Globetrotters.

Abe took his team of 5 and barnstormed the country playing anybody and everybody they could, with little to no pay. They chose the name Harlem because, at the time, Harlem was the mecca for African-American coulture and basketball. They only had 5 players, as I mentioned before, so if one got injured, Abe would have to suit up. I would have loved to see this 5’5 little Jewish guy running around the court with these guys. Lol.

Marques Haynes was a college player at Langston University at the time. After Langston beat the Trotters, Abe offered Haynes a job with them. Haynes was known for his incredible ball handling skills and I have heard that Cousy and Maravich fashioned their game after his. Haynes was the first to implement the shtick and gimmick routines that the Globetrotters became known for. The reasoning behind the gimmicks initially was to get the crowd on their side and to help them forget the fact that an all black team was coming into their town and beating their all white teams by large amounts.

There is so much more to the story of the Globetrotters and I recommend reading up on them. I will get back to the historical significance they had on the sport.

On Feb 19th, 1948, the Globetrotters were invited to play the Minneapolis Lakers in an exhibition game. The Lakers were led by George Mikan and were the best professional team by far. The Lakers were also an all white team, as was every team in the NBA at the time. The Globetrotters beat them 61-59 on a buzzer beater. This obviously showed that black athletes could compete with white athletes and even more so, they belonged.

2 years later, Chuck Cooper was the first African-American player to be drafted in the NBA.

[knowledge585Participant]

thats deep

[Author]

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