Plantation mentality

 I don't know what possessed Creighton basketball coach Greg McDermott to say what he said the other day. And don't tell me you do, either.

Why a white man in a roomful of black basketball players and a black assistant coach would say "I need everybody to stay on the plantation" in urging his team to stick together is a mystery, probably even to him. I imagine his brain screamed "WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST SAY??" as soon as the words cleared his lips. 

I imagine this, because before what he said even went fully public, he issued a public apology. And not one of those "mistakes were made" apologies. An actual apology that acknowledged how painful and radioactive a word "plantation" is when uttered in the presence of black Americans.

I don't know about anyone else, but I found this fairly extraordinary. I'm trying to think of the last time a public figure apologized for something that wasn't even public yet. Perhaps my memory isn't what it used to be, but I can't immediately think of one.

So, yes, I will give Greg McDermott credit for that. I will also give him credit for what seems an obvious sincerity and not just a trying-to-save-my-job ploy. And I'll do the latter because he already offered to resign.

His players (at least according to McDermott) said that's not what they wanted. And since no player or assistant coach has publicly disputed that, I have to conclude McDermott's version is the correct one.

However.

However, this does not mean I think McDermott is any way a wronged party here. Or that Creighton suspending him in any way makes him a victim of political correctness or cancel culture or whatever American bigots are calling simple respect for others these days.

He said what he said. And I will not trivialize it by calling it a slip of the tongue. Somewhere in his brain a connection was made with the darkest of historical roots -- was he channeling his great-great-grandpappy, perhaps? Who knows? -- and he gave voice to it.

Again, I don't know why, and neither do you. But I do know he did it in the context of high-end collegiate athletics, which have more than once been accused of harboring a plantation mentality themselves. And not without cause.

In other words, McDermott said what he said in the worst possible environment in which he could have said it. So, yes, he deserves whatever punishment his bosses think is right.

At the moment, that means he won't be coaching Creighton in its home season finale against Butler tomorrow. And McDermott took to social media to say he thinks that's as it should be.

So should we all.