ONCE a lily-white American pro basketball league, the National Basketball Association (NBA) is now dominated by African-Americans.
The NBA, in fact, has the highest percentage of black players in any of the four major professional team sports leagues (baseball, basketball, football and hockey) in the United States and Canada.
A survey showed that 74.2 percent of the players during the 2017-18 NBA campaign were African-Americans and 80.7 percent of them were people of color (including Latino and Asian players).
The first African-American ever to see action in an official NBA game was Earl Francis Lloyd.
Born in Alexandria, Virginia, the 6-foot-5 product of West Virginia State College made history after donning the Washington Capitols uniform against the host Rochester (New York) Royals (the forerunners of the Sacramento Kings) on October 31, 1950.
Nicknamed “The Big Cat,” Lloyd scored six points and grabbed a game-best 10 rebounds in a losing effort as the Royals claimed a 78-70 decision over the Capitols.
During the 1950-51 wars when he hit at a 6.1-point clip, Lloyd appeared in just seven games due to his being drafted into the U.S. Army at Fort Still, Oklahoma for a two-year stint.
Moreover, the Capitols disbanded on January 9, 1951, after playing only 35 games (10 wins-25 losses).
Known for his defense, Lloyd rejoined the NBA in 1952-53 with the Syracuse Nationals (the predecessors of the Philadelphia 76ers).
He and Jim Tucker became the first African-Americans to suit up for an NBA championship team when the duo helped guide the Nats to the league title in 1954-55. That season, Lloyd registered averages of a career-high 10.2 points and 7.7 rebounds in 72 appearances with the Nats, who beat the Fort Wayne (Indiana) Pistons (the forerunners of the Detroit Pistons), 4-3, in the Finals.
Overall, Lloyd played nine seasons in the NBA, norming 8.4 points in 560 regular games with Washington, Syracuse and Detroit. He hung up his jersey in 1960.
Lloyd went into coaching thereafter. According to Detroit News sportswriter Jerry Green, Detroit Pistons general manager Don Wattrick wanted to hire Lloyd as the club’s head coach in 1965.
It would have made Lloyd the first African-American head coach in U.S. pro team sports history. Instead, the job went to player Dave DeBusschere in a concurrent capacity – making him the youngest head coach in NBA history at age 24.
Lloyd eventually coached the Pistons early into the 1971-72 season (following the dismissal of Butch van Breda Kolff and Terry Dischinger on an interim basis) and went 20 wins-50 losses in the final 70 games. He was fired seven games (2-5) into the following campaign and replaced by Ray Scott. Lloyd later became a scout for the Pistons for five seasons.
Lloyd, who was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2003 under the “contributor” category, died on February 26, 2015 at age 86.