In an era of identity politics, I’m surprised how unbiased most professional sports teams are these days regarding drafting hometown heroes and/or ethnic exemplars.

Professional wrestling always loved to play up some ethnic or regional connection the wrestlers might have with a segment of the fan base. And in the past, pro teams looked to sign athletes who’d especially appeal to local residents, such as hometown players or New York teams looking for Jewish jocks. In fact, the NBA had a rule that assigned players to NBA franchises where they’d played in high school or college. That’s how Philadelphia wound up with Philadelphian Wilt Chamberlain, perhaps the all-time top NBA prospect.

It hasn’t hurt the attendance of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team over the generations that their stars have included a hometown boy (Don Drysdale), a Jew (Sandy Koufax), a Mexican (Fernando Valenzuela), and an Asian (Hideo Nomo). This offseason, the Dodgers signed the world’s top two Japanese players and have spoken of a strategy of becoming the favorite American franchise of Japan’s many baseball fans.

This year the Los Angeles Lakers of the NBA had the 17th draft pick in the first round. Still available at the time was Jaime Jaquez Jr., a 6’6″ 225 pound Mexican-American Southern Californian who started for four years at UCLA. Jacquez is a handsome guy (his father is Mexican-American, his mother Norwegian-American) known as “Juan Wick” because he looks vaguely like Keanu Reeves. Lately, he has grown Three Musketeers-like long hair and a Van Dyke beard and now resembles swordsman Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride.

And the guy can play basketball.

So, did the Lakers cement the loyalty of Southern California’s vast Mexican-American community by drafting the best Mexican-American player in Southern California (and maybe U.S. college basketball) history?

Nah, instead they drafted Jalen Hood-Schifino of Indiana U., who so far this season has played only in garbage time of seven games.

So, the Miami Heat snatched up Jaquez with the 18th pick. He quickly worked his way into their starting line-up and over the last 10 games has been averaging 36 minutes and 17 points, and is being talked about as the possible Rookie of the Year.

From ESPN:

Report: Some within Lakers wanted to draft Jaime Jaquez Jr.
Jesse Cinquini
Last updated: 2024/01/03 at 1:56 PM

Some people within the Los Angeles Lakers organization reportedly wanted the team to draft Jaime Jaquez Jr., who was selected by the Miami Heat with the No. 18 overall pick in the 2023 NBA Draft.

“I know there were some people in that organization who wanted Jaime Jaquez to stay in California and be a Laker,” a Western Conference executive told Heavy Sports. “He was the perfect role player for what they needed, he is a tough kid, he is a grinder. You could watch him last year and just tell he was ready to chip in for a good NBA team. The Laker like to use their picks to take big swings and not the safe bet, and that is how they were looking at Jalen [Hood-Schifino]. But they needed guys who could play now. And look at what Jaquez is doing. They blew it, for sure.”

It could be that Hood-Schifino, who is 28 months younger than Jaquez, will turn out the better player in the long run. But LeBron James probably isn’t going to be around with the Lakers in that long run.