Kanter, Calipari, Karakas, Kentucky What's In A Name?

The kid in the picture is Enes Kanter, just in case you have been living in Siberia the last 6 months. He is a basketball player from Turkey. He wants to play basketball for The University of Kentucky Wildcats. When he was in Turkey, there was only one way to play basketball, and that is for this thing they call a “Club” system over there. It is not like the United States where we have AAU, High School, College, and other outlets for amateurs to play ball. See, a long time ago, some really smart people figured out that you can make money from amateur athletes. When TV came along, it got worse. When Cable and Satellite TV came along, it went ballistic. In the US, you can play for any one of the kinds of teams mentioned and still be considered an amateur. In Turkey, it’s not gonna happen. You have one route to go if you stay in the country, and that is the Club system. For anything else you have to leave Turkey. And if you leave the club system after you start playing for them, and go to the NBA, you can be worth a lot of money. If you leave the club system and go to college, you are still worth a lot of money, but not to the club system in turkey anymore. They get nothing for all of their investment in you. All of the dollars they paid to keep you up, keep you fed and clothed, keep you living in a safe and decent neighborhood, none of that. Now, don’t get me wrong, they made money off of you. There are tickets, endorsement deals, and any number of other ways to make money off of you while you are there, but if you leave and go to a University in the US, they are out in the cold.

The GM of Fenerbache says he does not need or want money for Enes Kanter. So are we to believe that he did everything he says he did for Enes out of the good of his heart? Are we to believe that he is really a Turkish philanthropist instead of the GM of a professional basketball team trying to turn a profit?

The NCAA ultimately has to make that decision, we cannot. But ask yourself this, if the names involved were not Calipari and Kentucky, would there be this much talk about an 18 yr old kid from Turkey that wants to play college basketball?

Calipari’s and UK’s motivation in this situation is perfectly clear, and they are not trying to hide anything in this back and forth tango that seems to have broken out. They want this kid to come play basketball at Kentucky. Calipari wants Kanter to help him win a championship, and is willing to make him a top draft pick for trying to do that very thing. Kentucky wants a winner, and as long as this young man is eligible to play, they want him to play here. The Turkish GM says all he wants to do is cooperate and show the world that Enes is not an amateur athlete, and is not academic material. Seems to me that if he indeed was this philanthropist type he claims to be, he would want to do anything in his power to help Enes. But maybe he just isn’t quite that philanthropic?

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