Appropriately, as the National Basketball Association (NBA) celebrates its 75th anniversary, it included Wat Misaka as an important figure in its history. This might seem remarkable since Wataru “Wat” Misaka’s playing career consisted of only three games with the New York Knickerbockers. But Misaka’s mere presence on a roster in 1947 made him the first person of color to play in the Basketball Association of America (BAA), the predecessor to NBA, in the same calendar year that Jackie Robinson integrated Major League Baseball.
Historically, because America’s lo...