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Nikola Jokic has been the best basketball player in the world this decade. He has put forth one of the most statistically dominant stretches in the history of the sport. He is a three-time MVP and an NBA champion.
Yet the NBA, its players and much of the media never fully embraced him as the sport's premier figure.
For years, ESPN commentators told us Jokic could not be the face of the NBA because he is European. They said the same about Luka Doncic.
Apparently, those concerns no longer apply to Victor Wembanyama, who was born and raised in a suburb in west Paris.
Moments after the Spurs defeated the Thunder in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals, Kendrick Perkins declared on SportsCenter that Wembanyama is "the best thing that's happened to the NBA since LeBron James in 2003."
In 2023, Perkins challenged MVP voters to prove they weren't favoring White or European players by voting for someone other than Jokic, even if he deserved the award. Voters responded by selecting Joel Embiid, a Black European.
A year later, Perkins warned that "international players are taking over the game of basketball."
Others voiced similar frustrations. Before Jokic won his championship, Draymond Green told Gilbert Arenas that "European players have not caught the same flak of not winning a championship as American players, and I don't understand it."
Even after Jokic delivered a title, many remained reluctant to acknowledge him as the world's best player. Former ESPN broadcaster Mark Jones said he could never view Jokic that way. Arenas went further, openly calling on American-born players to "take out" and "remove" Europeans, like Jusuf Nurkic, from the game.
"They are takin' the league from our people," Arenas added.
At the time, I argued that these anti-European narratives were actually a coded resistance to accepting White players as equal to, or better than, their peers.
To be clear, the excitement surrounding Wembanyama is understandable. At 7-foot-4 with guard skills and a jump shot, he looks unlike any player who has come before him. Like Shaquille O'Neal and LeBron James, he possesses a combination of physical traits that immediately captures attention. He may have the highest ceiling of any prospect in NBA history.
Put simply, Wembanyama would probably be a bigger star than Jokic even if they were the same color. At the same time, Jokic would almost certainly be a bigger star if he were not White.
The anti-European backlash toward Jokic also coincided with the blatant racism Caitlin Clark faced in and around women's basketball. The timing wasn't accidental. A day after Jokic led Denver to a championship, ESPN published an article describing him as the latest "Great White Hope," despite offering no evidence that anyone viewed him through that lens.
Even Barstool podcaster Ryen Russillo acknowledged last month that there was an effort to knock Jokic from his position atop the sport "in part because he's white."
Jason Whitlock discussed the subject this week on Fearless. During the segment, former ESPN reporter Steve Kim argued that the same dynamic exists in boxing.
"I'd be stunned if these guys don't have a bit of color or racial bias," Kim said of the different treatment afforded to Wembanyama and Jokic.
"I see this a lot in boxing. If it's a European fighter, a white European, I see a lot of boxing fans try to tear them down. But if it's a black European, let's say from Africa, it's different. It's still not American, but they're more accepted as elite fighters."
Kim's observation helps explain why Wembanyama's rise feels different.
NBA culture may never embrace Wembanyama the way it did American-born Black superstars if he avoids the league's preferred cultural circles, be it Hollywood, hip hop, partisan politics or social activism. Still, there is little reason to believe it will resist acknowledging his greatness the way it did Jokic's.
The discourse around Jokic carried an unmistakable hostility. There is a territorial element to many of these discussions. Notice the claims from Black players that basketball is "our league."
But the players are more symptoms than causes.
For years, major institutions in American culture have promoted the idea that racial identity is central to social and political life. That environment naturally encourages people to view achievement, status, and influence through a racial lens. Particularly, the Democratic Party has worked to convince Black Americans that White people should be viewed as their adversaries.
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Activist and social media personality Dr. Umar Johnson articulated this perspective during a discussion about Eminem in 2023. Johnson took particular offense to claims that Eminem could be considered the greatest rapper ever.
"No non-African can ever be the best of anything African," Johnson said. "It's an insult to the ancestors. It's an insult to the race and it's an insult to every black person."
He continued:
"Eminem has all the privileges of a white male and all the privileges of being in the hip hop community, so we got to be careful about letting non-Africans into our community."
That mindset appears remarkably similar to how some Black players, commentators and media members discuss White basketball players.
This isn't new. Larry Bird encountered the same phenomenon in the 1980s.
"Larry Bird is a very, very good basketball player," Dennis Rodman famously said. "But if he was black, he'd be just another guy."
Of course, Bird is one of the ten greatest players in NBA history. Jokic is already building a résumé that places him among the 20 greatest players ever. Both were better than the overwhelming majority of the Black players they competed against. Yet cultural stereotypes continue to portray White athletes as less athletic, less gifted and less deserving of elite status.
Wisconsin-Green Bay basketball coach Doug Gottlieb made a similar observation in 2024.
"Most black [people] and a lot of white guys think white guys can't hoop and need special treatment in order to be viewed on the same level."
He has a point.
Many people have been taught that White athletes benefit from hidden advantages while lacking the physical gifts of their Black counterparts. These beliefs naturally create animosity toward white players. How could they not?
Of course, it's all a lie.
The most famous American athletes of the past 40 years are Black, including Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, LeBron James, Steph Curry, Serena Williams and Patrick Mahomes.
The only visible form of racism in sports is toward white athletes. The examples are striking.
The resistance to Jokic was never really about nationality. The issue was always about Jokic emerging as the world's best player during a period when open hostility toward White people had become increasingly acceptable in influential corners of media, politics and culture. In some cases, like in sports media, anti-White bigotry was often rewarded.
And let's dispense with the notion that NBA culture was ever protective of American identity. The league's most prominent players spent years criticizing the United States while remaining largely silent about the conduct of the NBA's business partners in China.
So yes, the NBA is likely to embrace Wembanyama in ways it never did Jokic.
The league and its media ecosystem were never comfortable with a White player, whether European or American, occupying the throne as basketball's unquestioned king. Not in this era.
If anything, many of the same voices will enthusiastically elevate Wembanyama because he is the first truly acceptable challenger to snatch the title of best player in the world from the big White Serbian.
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