In light of the shooting of Jacob Blake which prompted the Milwaukee Bucks to boycott Game 5 of their series against Orlando Magic, the NBA has gone further to postpone all three scheduled playoff games would have taken place on Wednesday.
Blake, an African-American man, was shown in a clip that went viral on the internet, to have been shot seven times in the back by police on Sunday. His family, however, have confirmed he is recovering in hospital and is conscious.
But he is paralysed from the waist down and his lawyers said it will take “a miracle” for him to walk again.
The top-seeded team in the Eastern Conference who hold a 3-1 lead over the Magic, took to the court for pre-game warm-ups but refused to return for the game when they were due. Milwaukee is in the state of Wisconsin, just 40 miles from Kenosha, where the shooting took place.
The Bucks’ game and two other games, which had been scheduled for Wednesday, with the Oklahoma Thunder taking on the Houston Rockets and the Los Angeles Lakers looking to close out the series against the Portland Trail Blazers in Game 5 were all postponed.
The NBA released a statement announcing its decision to postpone all three games after the Milwaukee Bucks were a no show and reports suggested the later games would follow the same course.
“The NBA and the National Basketball Players Association today announced that in light of the Milwaukee Bucks’ decision to not take the floor today for Game 5 against the Orlando Magic, today’s three games – Bucks vs Magic, Houston Rockets vs Oklahoma City Thunder and Los Angeles Lakers vs Portland Trail Blazers – have been postponed. Game 5 of each series will be rescheduled,” the statement read.
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In the Western Conference, the sixth game of the Denver Nuggets-Utah Jazz and Los Angeles Clippers-Dallas Mavericks series remains scheduled for Thursday, along with the opening game of Boston Celtics-Toronto Raptors Eastern Conference second-round match-up.
Bucks owners Marc Lasry, Wes Edens, and Jamie Dinan, however, released a joint statement in support of the team’s players.
“We fully support our players and the decision they made. Although we did not know beforehand, we would have wholeheartedly agreed with them,” the statement said.
“The only way to bring about change is to shine a light on the racial injustices that are happening in front of us. Our players have done that and we will continue to stand alongside them and demand accountability and change.”
The Orlando Magic, who reportedly would have refused to accept a forfeit from the Bucks, released a statement in support of their playoff opponents.
“Today we stand united with the NBA Office, the National Basketball Players Association, the Milwaukee Bucks and the rest of the league condemning bigotry, racial injustice and the unwarranted use of violence by police against people of color,” the Magic statement says.
A statement in support of the players was also released by the National Basketball Referees Association (NBRA).
“The NBRA stands in solidarity with our players’ decision to boycott tonight’s games in protest of the continued unjustified killing of black men and women by law enforcement,” the statement says. “There are more important issues in our country than basketball and we hope this will inspire change.”
Following the postponement of Wednesday night’s games, all players were invited to attend a meeting to discuss their next steps.
Reports revealed that the LA Clippers and Los Angeles Lakers players moved a motion to boycott the remainder of the season but players from most of the other teams wanted the postseason to continue.
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