Star NBA Players Cash Checks From Chinese Sneaker Companies Proudly Using Slave Labor

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NBA players, coaches, and league officials have embraced social justice warriordom for the past several years, regularly denouncing American politicians and institutions for their perceived lack of left wing wokeness. But one glaring hypocrisy has remained: the NBA has been unwilling to utter a word of criticism about Chinese genocide, slavery, concentration camps, destruction of democracy in Hong Kong and the lack of basic human rights in their country.

Instead, they’ve been happy to cash checks from China worth billions of dollars, all while saying nothing at all about China’s global transgressions. But that silence is about to get even harder. Because recently, several American companies have attempted to distance themselves from Chinese genocide, including, to their credit, Nike, which has pledged that their products won’t be made with cotton produced by Muslim slave laborers in Chinese concentration camps in the Xinjiang region of the country. But that decision has provoked fury inside of China, and two Chinese sneaker companies, Li-Ning and Anta, seeking to profit off the negative consumer reaction to Nike, have pledged that they will continue to proudly use cotton produced from Muslim slave labor.

Let me repeat this, in response to Nike’s statement that they won’t make their products with cotton produced from Muslim slave labor, two Chinese sneaker companies have proudly asserted that they will continue to use that cotton produced by Muslim slave labor.

This is astounding.

What’s even more astounding? The NBA has a bevy of players with shoe deals with either Li-Ning or Anta. Yes, you heard that right. NBA players, the same players who have been denouncing and ridiculing American democratic institutions for their perceived lack of wokeness, are pocketing money from Chinese companies profiting directly off cotton produced by Muslim slave laborers.

Think about this for a minute. In 2021, we’ve got star American athletes still profiting off cotton plantation slave labor.

Who are these players? Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors has a reported $80 million dollar deal with Anta. So does his Warrior teammate James Wiseman. Has Golden State Warrior head coach Steve Kerr, a consistent left wing zealot, commented on at least two of his players pocketing money from companies profiting off Muslim slave labor cotton-picking? If so, I must have missed it. Maybe it’s also a difficult question for Kerr. (This, for the unaware, was Steve Kerr’s cowardly comment when he was asked if he supported basic human rights in China).

The Los Angeles Lakers Alex Caruso also has a deal with Anta. Does LeBron James, social justice warrior extraordinaire, think it’s appropriate for his teammate to be profiting off Chinese slave labor? We don’t know. James is so excited to have Space Jam 2 open in China that he won’t say a word of negative criticism about his good buddy Chairman Xi.

Dwyane Wade has both a shoe deal and a clothing line with Li-Ning and that deal has been so successful Wade is recruiting additional players for his slave labor clothing brand. He’s really riding in high (slave labor) cotton, y’all. Thanks to Wade’s profits from slavery, he’s added CJ McCollum and D’Angelo Russell to his cotton plantation family. Both men recently penned their own endorsement deals with slave laborers and are proudly wearing Li-Ning gear in NBA games.

Not to be outdone, Jimmy Butler of the Heat and Fred VanVleet also recently added cotton plantation slave labor profiteer to their endorsement profiles, signing their own new deals with Li-Ning. Who knew that slave labor was so profitable?! What a deal!

So you might be wondering, does the NBA believe it’s appropriate for some of its star players to be wearing sneakers and gear during league games that have been proudly produced by Chinese companies that have explicitly endorsed their use of Muslim slave labor for their products? And do these star players think it’s appropriate, given their position as social justice warriors, to be endorsing products produced with slave labor?

Well, the league and the players have all suddenly gone silent. Every single player and the NBA itself has declined comment when asked why NBA players are endorsing products produced with slave labor and wearing them during actual NBA games.

This would be completely stunning, if it weren’t actually par for the course.

Now here’s the real question: will the NBA media, which functions mostly as cheerleaders for the league, actually continue to press the league and the players on this massive hypocrisy, or will the league continue to shut up and dribble for China with barely a hint of criticism? And could NBA commissioner Adam Silver actually own up to the league’s expressed ideals and ban the use of slave labor products during games, potentially angering his Chinese bosses?

Ha, I think you know how this plays out.

The NBA will keep right on taking money from modern day Nazis running actual Muslim slave labor cotton plantations, and the NBA will keep right on bowing for their Chinese masters.

It’s pathetic, but it’s reality.

These players, coaches and league officials either aren’t smart enough to understand that they are pawns in China’s global propaganda battle against the United States, or they know exactly what they’re doing and if you pay them enough money, they just don’t care at all.

Because when push comes to shove, the NBA’s star players and their league officials are all willing to shut up and dribble for Chairman Xi and his slave labor cotton plantations.

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Written by Clay Travis

Clay Travis is the founder of the fastest growing national multimedia platform, OutKick, that produces and distributes engaging content across sports and pop culture to millions of fans across the country. OutKick was created by Travis in 2011 and sold to the Fox Corporation in 2021.

One of the most electrifying and outspoken personalities in the industry, Travis hosts OutKick The Show where he provides his unfiltered opinion on the most compelling headlines throughout sports, culture, and politics. He also makes regular appearances on FOX News Media as a contributor providing analysis on a variety of subjects ranging from sports news to the cultural landscape. Throughout the college football season, Travis is on Big Noon Kickoff for Fox Sports breaking down the game and the latest storylines.

Additionally, Travis serves as a co-host of The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show, a three-hour conservative radio talk program syndicated across Premiere Networks radio stations nationwide.

Previously, he launched OutKick The Coverage on Fox Sports Radio that included interviews and listener interactions and was on Fox Sports Bet for four years. Additionally, Travis started an iHeartRadio Original Podcast called Wins & Losses that featured in-depth conversations with the biggest names in sports.

Travis is a graduate of George Washington University as well as Vanderbilt Law School. Based in Nashville, he is the author of Dixieland Delight, On Rocky Top, and Republicans Buy Sneakers Too.

27 Comments

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  2. Yes, many of these players are stupid, ignorant, and uneducated. However, the few who are aware of Chinese propaganda will take the money every time. They have no loyalty to this country and only care about enriching themselves and their decadent lifestyles.

  4. We live in such a dumb time. It couldn’t be more obvious the Chinese government’s strategy is to attempt to corrode the United States from within by exploiting the greed of its citizens. Those that profess to be the “wokest” are the ones for sale. The Biden family cash grabs. Dianne Feinstein’s Chinese spy “driver” on her staff for 40 years. Eric Swalwell’s Chinese spy lover. Hollywood movie studios taking billions in financing from China. Etc, etc, etc…. I was told it was only the rich Republicans that were the greedy bastards.

    It’s all so obvious that everyone knows it’s true.

    “We know they’re lying, they know they’re lying, they know that we know they’re lying, we also know that they know that we know they’re lying, but they STILL LIE.”

  5. Black People Showing Support For A Communist Slave State.

    Can’t make this shiznit up.

    watch the opening 15-20 minutes of the movie “Midway” from 2018.

    it shows how cozy America was to Japan as Japan planned their attacks and destruction of America.

    Bill Clinton gave China Technology that enabled ballistic missles.

    Obama and Obiden gave Iran Nuclear.

    China will now get the entire Electric Car Chip Business just in time for American Black Athletes to get $Millions from China.

    a Reset is coming and any athlete on China’s side can go live there, but they won’t accept you CLOWNs!

  7. In fairness, credit to the New York Times for committing actual journalism. They didn’t touch on the hypocrisy element with the NBA criticizing the US but defending China, but at least it was a start. Hopefully we will see some follow up.

  8. Also, NBA media can’t be bothered to ask LeBron, Kerr, Gregg Popovich, Steve Nash, Jaylen Brown or any of the other woke big mouths of the NBA why so many black civilians physically challenge law enforcement officers to their own detriment, ignoring archives full of bad outcomes? They have as much respect for the law as their defenders have for the truth.

  12. Lemme get this straight…a lot of NBA players with a certain skin suit color which that skin color group are famously bitter about a certain event in American history are actively profiting from slave labor on cotton plantations?

    You can’t make this stuff up.

    • Great point, Ray. Not sure which is greater, their ignorance, their hypocrisy or their callousness.

      My guess is it’s just like their view of racism: It ain’t racist unless it’s happening to black people.

      So this becomes, it ain’t slavery unless it’s happening to black people. Most of these dummies think America invented and exclusively condoned slavery.

  21. Great article Clay! It’s one thing to say the NBA is a pawn of China but so glad you pointed how who the worst offenders are, especially that little weasel Steve Kerr. We haven’t watched an NBA game in 4 or 5 years, partly because of their hatred of America and partly because the game stinks. Take me back to the days of Michael Jordan!

  23. Great article. It is always difficult to put your money where your mouth is. Especially for these faux social warrior justices who love to virtue signal as long as it doesn’t cost them anything. They enjoy the freedoms paid for by the blood of patriots and yet they are happy to implicitly endorse China while kneeling for The Star Spangled Banner.

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