Rockets GM Daryl Morey tweeted a message of support for the Hong Kong protestors. Rockets owner denounced it...."whoa whoa, his views, his views, NOT OURS!!". China now says they're suspending work with Rockets (I'm not sure what kind of work they do collaborate on, but know that with Yao there has been a historical relationship). I found this response by the owner kind of interesting:
"Everything is fine with Daryl and me. We got a huge backlash, and I wanted to make clear that the organization has no political position. We're here to play basketball and not to offend anybody."
I don't think it should be controversial to take a relatively benign stand of support in the Hong Kong deal (I'm curious who the "huge backlash" was from), but get that business relationship are complex and the risk/reward models aren't always what they seem they should be in instances like this. I just think it's funny a huge deference to China and concern about politics here in the guise that the NBA is "just about playing basketball", but in other instances no real issue (in fact, often cheerleading) when Popovich and Steve Kerr go scorched earth on political views they don't agree with (which I think is fine and good...free speech that makes us a better country than, say, China).
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/27780777/china-suspends-work-rockets-gm-tweet
"Everything is fine with Daryl and me. We got a huge backlash, and I wanted to make clear that the organization has no political position. We're here to play basketball and not to offend anybody."
I don't think it should be controversial to take a relatively benign stand of support in the Hong Kong deal (I'm curious who the "huge backlash" was from), but get that business relationship are complex and the risk/reward models aren't always what they seem they should be in instances like this. I just think it's funny a huge deference to China and concern about politics here in the guise that the NBA is "just about playing basketball", but in other instances no real issue (in fact, often cheerleading) when Popovich and Steve Kerr go scorched earth on political views they don't agree with (which I think is fine and good...free speech that makes us a better country than, say, China).
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/27780777/china-suspends-work-rockets-gm-tweet
