Becky Hammon, the NBA, and Selective Reputation

The NBA has built an image of being the progressive sports league. But that image seems to stop when it comes to hiring the league's first woman head coach.

In American sports, every league has some sort of reputation. In most cases, this reputation is formed through decisions while establishing a brand identity for a league. In the case of the NBA, that reputation in recent years has been being the most forward-thinking and progressive league in the United States. The NBA got ahead of the sports gambling trend for instance when they partnered with MGM Grand in 2018. The league also took the Black Lives Matter movement seriously, displaying it prominently on its court during the bubble tournament of 2020. The league was also the first to have a woman referee a game back in 1997, which has since been adopted by other leagues in recent years.

This reputation of being forward-thinking is one that the NBA has worked at tirelessly as an entity for decades. It can be argued however that this progressive approach does not extend to the owners of the 30 franchises in the league. As of now, there is only one black majority owner of a team (Michael Jordan of the Charlotte Hornets) and three woman-owned teams (Jeanie Buss of the Los Angeles Lakers, Ann Kroenke of the Denver Nuggets, and Gayle Benson of the New Orleans Pelicans). By and large, the…