Mark Cuban's Apology

No matter what career you choose, public relations and how you are perceived by the public plays a big role. This is especially true with sports celebrities. Right now in the world of sports racism is a hot topic because of the actions of Donald Sterling, the owner of the NBA team, the Clippers, and his racial comments. On Wednesday another NBA owner Mark Cuban interviewed with Inc. magazine. In his interview he talked about our personal and societal prejudices. Though I have read a lot about this, I have not listened to the full interview, nor do I know enough about Mark Cuban’s character to make a blatant statement about him. However, I do respect a lot of what he said. What I would like to focus on is how Mark Cuban handled the reaction of what people said about him commenting about a “black kid wearing a hoodie.”

Clearly, this comment or reference made many think of the death of Trayvon Martin. As a public figure and owner of a company Cuban really needs to be careful about what he says. Just as we talked about in class, he needs to know how people will perceive him in an interview especially with those comments. It was not smart of him to make that comment; though I do not believe that he was trying to be rude or call out Trayvon Martin, but he did and now he has to clean up what he said.

The next day Cuban made a statement on Twitter apologizing to Martin’s family and stating that the comment was not intentional. Then he restated the main point of his interview and stood by what he said regarding prejudices and bigotry.

As I read the article and watched the clips attached with it, I really like what Ryan Clark, a NFL player for the Redskins, said about this issue. I respect Cuban for addressing tough topics that are typically avoided.  I also appreciate that he immediately made a statement and apologized for what he said, he accepted what he said was wrong, but was still able to make his point.

After watching the parts of his interview and reading his statement, I believe that Cuban was sincere in his apology and did not intend to offend the Martin family. However, in the future Cuban needs to watch every word he says and be aware of how he can be perceived by anyone. 

This is the article from ESPN.com