It Just Doesn't Matter

 It just doesn't matter what a Texas Tech "Super Fan" yelled at 19-year-old, Marcus Smart on Saturday during the final minutes of the OSU @ TT basketball game. People from both sides will hear and see what they want to hear and see, and in 48 hours, it'll all be forgotten.

What we saw on Saturday was a scary young black man, LEAP VIOLENTLY at an upstanding older white man, and it scared the hell out of us. 

Hell, I'm surprised someone in the arena didn't shoot Smart dead. On the spot. You know they pack heat in Lubbock.

The Super Fan (Some old fart named Orr) claims to have called Smart, a Big 12 superstar and NBA-bound athlete, a "piece of crap". (Still a racial slur to many young black men). Others have said they heard Orr tell the young athlete to "go back to Africa!"

Whatever it was, Smart didn't like it.

 Later, Smart was handed a 3 game suspension -killing the Cowboys season- and both he and his coach issued a public apology.

Texas Tech's response was non existent, only the Super Fan could save the day by humbling himself and offering to sit out the remaining games that make up the fabulous Texas Tech Basketball season.
He was not punished by the University. His pain was self chosen.

When I think of Lubbock, I think of a quote:

"...white people are afraid of black people. Period. When we fantasize about being mugged or home invaded, what's the image of the perpetrator in our heads? Is it the freckled-face kid from down the street – or is it someone who is, if not black, at least poor?" -Michael Moore

It is frankly amazing that more athletes don’t go after guys like Orr. The fans in Seattle, the ones who cause earthquakes and have become famous as the '12th Man' out there, what they mostly do is yell. Guys like Orr call kids names. Or make obscene gestures at them, the way Jeff Orr did with a Texas A&M player named Bryan Davis a couple of years ago.
  
Smart's apology is one of the most respectful things I've ever seen. You see, African Americans keep their expectations low. That's how they survive, and it's damn sure how they survive in Lubbock.

Also, It's Black History Month and EVERY American should see 12 Years A Slave.

Texas Tech,
I prescribe 200 years of progress and call me in the morning.
Dr. J