Kieran Shannon: Whatever the outcome, Bernard O’Byrne case likely to hurt Irish basketball

In O’Byrne the Basketball Ireland board are now dealing with a man fighting for his reputation as much as his job, one which he has carried out impressively

As well as being CEO and secretary general of Basketball Ireland, Bernard O’Byrne is the president of the FIBA Small Nations Commission. Picture: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

This should have been one of his proudest months coming up, an opportunity to enjoy some of the limelight.

As well as being CEO and secretary general of Basketball Ireland, Bernard O’Byrne, as a respected and influential member of FIBA Europe, is the president of the FIBA Small Nations Commission.

Irish basketball’s senior teams currently play at the Small Nations level.

Next Sunday our senior women’s team fly out to Cyprus, hoping to medal at the six-team tournament. Under normal circumstances O’Byrne would be one of the officials in Nicosia presenting those medals on July 25.

Then a fortnight later the National Basketball Arena, his home and office for the past 10 years, will host the men’s European Small Nations tournament. It would only be human for O’Byrne to have been walking even taller than usual around Tallaght that week of August 10-15, his own country hosting and possibly winning a tournament he found a way to stage when for so long it seemed Covid would make it an impossibility.

But now it’s uncertain, and probably unlikely, that he will make it to Cyprus for the championships that he presides over. He may not even be in the Arena in August for the tournament he brought to the place because he may not be still in his job. For as you know, he’s attracted a different kind of limelight by virtue of a terribly ill-judged and offensive post on social media.

Social media and many other parties duly expressed its outrage and disappointment, including the Sports Minister himself, Jack Chambers. In a statement he issued to Basketball Ireland’s chairperson Paul McDevitt last Friday, Chambers noted how O’Byrne’s comment stood “in stark contrast to the shared objective of inclusion and diversity inherent to sport” and “the ethics or standards we have come to expect from the CEO of a national governing body of a sport”. He concluded by saying it was incumbent on his board to “seriously reflect” on that and “take appropriate action”.

It was a necessary letter for the board of Basketball Ireland to receive but a deeply humiliating and indeed paradoxical one as well: Here was Irish basketball receiving a lecture on diversity and inclusion when for several generations it has been top of the class in that very subject.

Last summer, as the Black Lives Matter campaign was both so heavily supported and derided in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, Darren Randolph and his brother Neil, both Irish internationals, spoke about what it was like growing up playing sport in this country as a black person.

“Any of the racism I experienced was never in basketball,” said Darren.

“It was in rugby, football, or Gaelic.”

Neil, a leading basketballer like his American-born father Ed, concurred. “It definitely was easier in basketball. I don’t think I ever experienced that type of comments in my direction in basketball at all. I can’t say the same when it has come to Gaelic football or to soccer. I’m trying to find a reason for it, (maybe it’s because) there is a lot of black culture and influence in basketball and those who play in basketball are aware of that.”

Irish basketball courts weren’t always so welcoming. Back in 1980, one of the first two black American players to play for a Cork club in the national league, Wayne Williams, bloodied an Irish opponent’s nose and knocked out one of his teeth during one of his first games. When team-mates and officials of his Blue Demons team ran on to restrain him and ask why such a mellow character had become so incensed, he let it be known he’d been called the N word.

Dave Beckom, his team-mate and compatriot, would later recall: “After the game Wayne said: ‘I did that because I wanted to send it out — no one else in this league should ever be called that name.’ And I guess it worked. He might have got kicked out of that game and got suspended for a few more but no other player that year ever called us the N word. We encountered little to no racism (after that).”

It was through scrapes and incidents like Williams’ which paved the way for the Randolphs, sons of a father of the same generation as Williams, to feel so welcome on the indoor courts compared to the playing fields of this country.

And Bernard O’Byrne had been highly conscious of maintaining that track record by establishing an inclusion and diverse committee. But already Hilary Nets has stepped down from that committee after O’Byrne’s comment hardly chimed with its ethos.

The dilemma for McDevitt and its board now is in deciding what is “appropriate action”. Sponsors, existing and prospective, are bound to be uneasy with the optics of O’Byrne remaining in situ. Probably more importantly, so does a considerable part of the Irish basketball community, regardless of their colour or how appreciative they may be for what O’Byrne has achieved in the past.

Chambers’ statement seemed to infer that O’Byrne’s position is untenable and future government funding may be withheld.

But in O’Byrne the board are now dealing with a man fighting for his reputation as much as his job, one which he has carried out impressively. He has lawyered up and from his FAI days is more experienced in these kind of situations than the board are.

Last year the 67-year-old signed a two-year extension to his contract, with the possibility of that term being extended for even longer. Any payout or settlement could be as costly as what the Government and sponsors are offering — or potentially withholding from — the sport now, (Those senior teams playing in the Small Nations, the Irish U16 men’s team with seven of its 12 players being black, showcasing how truly inclusive and diverse the sport is, do not receive a cent of government funding or support, leaving the players often having to pay for the honour of playing for their country).

After clearing the sport of the €1.5m debt it was burdened with, O’Byrne, in one way or another, could end up costing it another small fortune.