NBA elite likely knew more about Suns owner Robert Sarver than they told us

You have to believe now that on Tuesday, Sept. 13, a week ago, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver knew the ultimate fate of Robert Sarver.

He must have known that day that ultimately Sarver would relinquish his ownership of his NBA and WNBA franchises – the Phoenix Suns and Phoenix Mercury.

Because on that day when Silver announced the results of the NBA investigation of Sarver, its one-year suspension and $10 million fine, the lay of the land was very weird – a Dali landscape, a Zappa jazz-fusion.

It was surreal and indecipherable.

I was telling colleagues this is one of the weirdest stories I’ve ever seen.

NBA's power dynamic is changing

The NBA is a professional sports league dominated by African American players (roughly 75%) who have grown richer and more powerful by the year.

We are watching, and this was yet another chapter in, the slow-motion and logical takeover of the league by the people who transformed it and made it wildly successful beyond its humble origins.

Another view: Fans have more power over Sarver than Silver, Paul or Taurasi

Part of the progression to tomorrow’s NBA is that white executives who offend the sensibilities of Black players, coaches and executives will not be tolerated.

And that’s what made Sept. 13 so weird.

The NBA’s elite were silent.

It would be another day before the game’s top players would emerge and criticize the NBA’s decision on Sarver.

Why were James and Paul so tepid?

When LeBron James and Chris Paul finally spoke out on Twitter on Wednesday, Sept. 14, their remarks were ambiguous. They didn’t like the league’s punishment, but they only implied they wanted Sarver banned from the game.

“Our league definitely got this wrong,” wrote James.

Paul wrote, “I was and am horrified and disappointed by what I read. This conduct especially towards women is unacceptable and must never be repeated.”

It seemed to me at the time that they were pulling punches. They could have been much more forceful.

In his tweet, James even reaffirmed his confidence in NBA leadership. “I love this league and I deeply respect our leadership. But this isn’t right. There is no place for misogyny, sexism, and racism in any work place.”

They must know something, I thought at the time.

The unspoken background on Sarver

In his press conference, Silver told the national media he had information he could not divulge that shaped his decision. I believe now that LeBron James and Chris Paul and the other NBA elect had the same information.

I wrote a column headlined “Robert Sarver is an SOB, but he’s a complicated SOB.” In it I expressed my suspicions:

Robert Sarver is an oddball. He lacks people skills and sensitivity that led to mistreatment of employees and some truly bizarre and offensive behavior.

But missed by many in the march to judgment was that Sarver had been changing in important ways. He turned the keys of his franchise over to two extraordinary men, who happened to be African American, who rebuilt the Suns and returned the team to its former glory. He was also celebrated by the WNBA commissioner as a “model” for league owners.

Is Robert Sarver a racist? No

Is he a racist?

Would a racist offend his own fan base and a majority of Arizona voters by opposing a hard-nosed immigration bill that put a target on the back of every Latino citizen? I don’t think so.

Robert Sarver dressed his Suns in Spanish-language “Los Suns” jerseys to decry Senate Bill 1070 at a time when polls showed strong majorities of Arizonans and Americans supported the new law.

When Sarver used the N-word he used it in quoting other Black men. He was foolish not to know that was offensive to African Americans, and he ignored warnings that this is the case. But even Black people acknowledge that their culture – their music and speech – has been normalizing the N-word.

Young white people (who constitute a strong majority of the consumers of rap and hip-hop) and young Latino people are picking it up in their banter in the way Black people use the word.

There’s a brilliant discussion on the N-word by New York Times culture writers Wesley Morris and Jenna Wortham, both African American, who acknowledge the word has been unleashed in modern culture and why it so offends Black people to hear white people use it.

He chose to spare the Phoenix Suns

By selling his ownership pieces in both teams, Sarver is sparing the NBA, the Suns and Mercury players and staff, a bloodletting that would have surely followed.

His own threshold for pain would have been tested had he tried to resume ownership a year from now.

One of the great puzzles of this saga was the behavior of Adam Silver. Many saw this as out of character for an NBA commissioner who has won the respect of the men in this game and the fans who follow it.

The Sarver episode is being described as Silver's first big mistake. A stain on his legacy.

It may be years before we know what really happened with Sarver, but my guess is that Adam Silver’s critics will one day see his decisions here in a different light - that he acted more deftly than anyone on the outside knew.

Phil Boas is an editorial columnist with The Arizona Republic. Email him at phil.boas@arizonarepublic.com.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: NBA elite likely knew more about Robert Sarver than they told us