After the negative reaction to not playing the national anthem before the games, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban said he did not “cancel” the song that has become the subject of social protests in recent years, after being a staple at sporting events since the First World War.
Cuban told ESPN’s “The Jump” program that the team was having ongoing conversations about the possibility of playing “The Star Spangled Banner”, but that “we probably would have ended up playing at some point when the fans came back”.
The national anthem, however, was not played in the Dallas arena on Monday night, when some fans were invited to watch the game in person for the first time this season.
Up to that point, it had not been documented that Cuban had told the team before the season to stop playing “The Star-Spangled Banner” at the American Airlines Center going forward.
On Wednesday, the NBA said it would require all teams to play the national anthem.
The Mavericks played the national anthem before Wednesday’s game and all the players seemed to be on their feet. Several fans applauded afterwards.
“We have not canceled the national anthem,” Cuban said on ESPN before the release. “We still had our flag proudly raised on the American Airlines Center wall and everyone had the opportunity to approach it and pray to it or salute it or whatever.”
The 62-year-old Pittsburgh native added that, “listening to the community, some people expressed their concerns, in fact, their fears that the national anthem would not fully represent them, that their voices were not being heard. “
In recent years, the NBA has refused to impose a rule that requires players to represent the anthem after athletes from all sports kneel in protest at social injustices.
Cuban was not the first to try to cut the national anthem. In 1954, then Baltimore Orioles general manager, Arthur Ehlers, stopped playing it before each game because “it tends to make music cheaper and lessen the emotion of the response,” he said, according to The Washington Post
Ehlers later relented.