Report: NBA Leads Pro Sports in Diversity

(CBS)  The NBA remains the sports leader for race and gender hiring on the court and in the front office, reports CBS Radio News correspondent Peter King.

The annual report card from the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida says the league gets the only combined A's for both categories - with high percentages of women and people of color working in the league and team front offices. And on the court, about 40 percent of the head coaches and assistants were minorities.

For first time, the report card has given A's to four leagues for race-based on-field diversity level and front office hiring.

The NBA gets an A plus for race and an A-minus for gender; the WNBA received A plusses for both categories while Major League Baseball received its first A for race and a B for gender.

The NFL gets an A-minus for race and a C on gender, while Major League Soccer gets an A and a C-plus in those categories, respectively.

The National Hockey League was not part of the study, which covers the 2008-2009 seasons.

[Kahuna_HOG]

I remember when Michael Jordan was on David Letterman during his hey days. Michael was showing off his new Air Jordan shoe, then asked Letterman "do you know the difference between my shoe and other brands?" "there's no white in it!" Letterman laughed and responded "well, neither does the NBA!" I think that metaphor is alive and well, still, today! I think when the report says 'more diversity,' it actually means more caucasian players are now in the NBA! Compared to...ahh..well, I guess there is no comparison. Unless one thinks back about 50 years!

[fghfdghdfghfgh]

Peter King lives in an urban environment. He knows crap about life in America. The teams are BLACK. I guess to Peter that's diversity.

[stephand]

Looking at the report a little more, it seems like it is a 1 way street. The grade is good if minorities are more or close to 24% of the players, office personnel coaches etc. This seems odd... Even if 100% is from minority groups it still gets an A. What about discrimination against majority groups? How can they call this a diversity report...

I agree with "iirishamerican" - this report should not even exist. It should be the best person for the job...

[stephand]

It seems like this report does not account for the players. I do not know how they get to an A grade if 82% of the players (according to the report) are from a minority groups when minorities are only 24% of the total population.

[iirishamerican]

Who cares about diversity? What happened to picking the best most qualified person for the job no matter what it is or would that make to much sense and wouldn't be politically correct?

[dwilson59]

NHL: UM............Do they have any diversity?

[dwilson59]

What about NASCAR

[excop1949]

Report: NBA Leads Pro Sports in Diversity

BUT THEY'RE NECK AND NECK IN CONVICTIONS...

[chatmandu7451]

What a load of crap. A waste of money by the UCF. I would think the NBA isn't in line with diversity because there are not enough white guys playing in relation to the percentage of whites v blacks in the population. Or am I being a racist for pointing this out. I guess racism or diversity only cuts one way. There will never be equality until race and gender is taken out of the equation. Does this silly report expect more females to be in executive positions of a male sport. Where would you expect the executives to come from to run a male dominated sport? Idiots at UCF. If you keep people of color and gender as the basis of your report and you will never be able to move on.

[riphamilton-2009]

"major league soccer" should be capitalized - at least afford soccer fans in this country that little bit of respect (the league draws essentially identical attendance figures per match compared to the NHL and NBA).

[dwilson59]

riphamilton-2009

There is Major League Soccer?

Never heard of it