The 2018-19 season couldn't be going much better for the Milwaukee Bucks.
They sit atop the league-wide standings and easily outpace the Golden State Warriors in terms of net rating. Giannis Antetokounmpo is an MVP candidate, and both he and Khris Middleton made the All-Star game. Mike Budenholzer is perhaps the frontrunner for Coach of the Year. Eric Bledsoe just signed a four-year, $70 million extension. And the team just signed Pau Gasol, affording it even more experienced depth up front after the trade deadline acquisition of Nikola Mirotic.
Bubbling beneath the surface of the Bucks' unprecedented success, though, is the institutional racism afflicting the city in which they play. According to the Brookings Institute, Milwaukee has more black-white segregation than any other city in America, a reality Malcolm Brogdon wants to change.
“Before I came to Milwaukee I’d heard the city was the most segregated in the country,” he told The Guardian's Donald McRae. “I’d heard it was racist. When I got here it was extremely segregated. I’ve never lived in a city this segregated. Milwaukee’s very behind in terms of being progressive. There are things that need to change rapidly.”
Team president Peter Feigin came under fire in 2016 for publicly acknowledging the racism in Milwaukee. Brogdon, a vocal opponent of President Donald Trump and ardent supporter of civil rights, believes the encouragement from the Bucks' ownership and other executives makes it easier for he and his teammates to affect change and bring people together, something they're already doing on the court.
“It’s amazing how sports is a way to control the masses. But it also unites people,” he said. “When you have a team on the rise, with a player like Giannis, it brings the city together. The owners, and Peter Feigin, have trademarked the team as something the city can really get behind as a progressive unit.”
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