The Suns' trade for Miles Bridges shines a light on how the NBA handles domestic violence

MARK BRODIE: The Phoenix Suns start training camp for their upcoming season later this month. It has been an eventful offseason for the Suns after their surprise trip to the NBA playoffs last season. And one of the most talked about moves was for a player named Miles Bridges.

The Suns traded for him from the Charlotte Hornets, giving up Grayson Allen, Royce O’Neale, and a 2033 first-round draft pick. But for many fans, the conversation about Bridges was less about his scoring and rebounding and more about his off-the-court behavior.

Bridges was arrested in 2022 after he allegedly assaulted his former girlfriend in front of their two children. Bridges was later charged with three felonies for which he received three years of probation after pleading no contest. In 2023, the NBA suspended Bridges for 30 games. He ultimately served 10 after the league said he’d already served the other 20 the previous season when he wasn’t with a team. Later that year, an arrest warrant was issued for Bridges in North Carolina stemming from a violation of a protective order. He ultimately turned himself in.

At the press conference the Suns held to introduce Bridges, General Manager Brian Gregory said Bridges’ past was part of the conversation before making the trade.

BRIAN GREGORY: Those questions are part of his story. He’s dealt with them before, and we’ll deal with them today as well. And I think those questions we are aware of and knew about, and that’s also why uh we took this decision so seriously during the process and when we made it. Miles has taken responsibility for his action. He’s shown remorse for those actions.

MARK BRODIE: At that same press conference, Bridges acknowledged the conflicting emotions some Suns fans are having with him on the team.

MILES BRIDGES: Like BG said, it is mixed feelings about me being here. But, you know, I take full responsibility, you know, in my actions. You know, I’ve been to counseling, I’ve been to therapy. Um, and right now, I’m just prioritizing, just like BG said, just being better as a man every day on and off the court, mainly off the court, um, and just being a great father and earning the trust of this fan base and this community.

MARK BRODIE: But that can be easier said than done, according to my next guests. Earl Smith is a professor and sociologist at the University of Delaware and a research scientist at the Center for the Study and Prevention of Gender-Based Violence there. Angie Hattery is a professor of Women and Gender Studies and co-director of that center. And when I spoke with them earlier, I asked Earl why these kinds of cases are not that uncommon in the world of sports.

EARL SMITH: We used to think it was based on the type of games that people play and preparation and how violent or not violent those games are. So you take a sport like golf, I think we all would agree that it’s not a violent sport.

MARK BRODIE: Mm-hmm.

EARL SMITH: But inside of golf, we have similar kinds of incidents of gender-based violence, sexual assaults, etc. — just as much as we have them deep inside the National Football League.

So it can’t be the type of sport that someone is playing, and this is the type of question that keeps us up at night, trying to figure out what the heck is going on. So we really don’t know. We can’t answer that question, why.

MARK BRODIE: Mm, interesting. Angie, in terms of the leagues themselves — I mean, Earl mentioned that, you know, obviously the PGA is different than the NFL, than the NBA, than MLB versus any other league. But are there sort of trends that you see in terms of how sports leagues try to handle players in them that are accused or have actually been adjudicated to have committed these kinds of crimes?

ANGIE HATTERY: I want to start by just also noting that although we have a lens on all of these cases of gender-based violence in sports, the rates are not actually higher than in the general population for men of the same age.

So the leagues, this is such a wonderful question. And I want to answer it or address it by pointing to, um, a really unique database that we developed called, well, it’s the Gender-Based Violence in Sport Database housed at the University of Delaware. There are currently over 500 cases in the database.

But because of the database, we’re able to actually provide some analysis around the leagues. And one of the things that I find interesting about the research from the database is that when we look at all of the leagues combined, in just about half of the cases, there’s no action taken in allegations of gender-based violence. And no action means no suspension by the league, no disciplinary action by the league nor anything in the criminal legal system.

When we drill down and look a little bit farther, we find that in fact, the personal conduct policies of the league do make a difference in terms of the kinds of sanctions that are distributed by a league. But at the end of the day, 83% of people who were credibly accused, charged and/or convicted of an act of gender-based violence in any sport, 83% continue to play or coach.

In the NBA, 87% continued to play after a conviction. So even in leagues like the NFL, which has a pretty robust personal conduct policy when it comes to these kinds of crimes — and the NBA doesn’t — whether there’s a policy or not, doesn’t for the most part affect whether players are then allowed to play after the conclusion of the case.

MARK BRODIE: Earl, what does that mean for not only those players, but I guess what does it maybe say about the leagues and maybe what kind of message does that send to society?

EARL SMITH: Well, it sends a big message. Here’s what it says: If you can run, hoop, dunk, hit a home run, you’re good to play regardless of your, quote, “off-the-field behavior.”

The case that we started our preparation to talk with you today, Miles Bridges, what we found striking in that case was there was credible evidence from the survivor. And this guy is still being allowed to play. And the woman who he abused said that he committed this violence in front of their kids.

And that takes us into a whole other area. But the fact that he’ll go out on a basketball court at the start of the next season after committing this violence — and doing it again. He broke parole. He broke his protection order to commit more violence against this woman, and still nothing was done.

MARK BRODIE: So Angie, what should teams and leagues do differently than what they’re doing now? Because it seems as though even for those leagues that have personal conduct policies or policies in place to deal with this kind of behavior, they’re not always following them in practice. So what should those organizations be doing differently?

ANGIE HATTERY: This is such a great question, and I appreciate it in part because one of the things I want to remind people of — and I talk about this not just with regards to sports but also sexual violence on college campuses, for example — that playing in the NBA or in the NFL or going to college is a privilege. It’s not a right.

And so organizations can in fact hold people accountable even without a criminal legal process, right? And people can sue back and forth. But the fear that these organizations seem to have, whether it’s a college campus or the NBA, “Oh, you know, we don’t want to harm someone’s career. Oh, we don’t, you know, this stuff.”

The truth is working is a privilege. It’s not No one has a right to play in the NBA, right?

And so part of it, I think, is just beginning to shift the power discussion a little bit. But what can they do? We write in in a couple of articles that have been published in the last couple years: Be brave. Be courageous. Um, try to set a different tone. Um, don’t be bullied into, as as happens in all of these cases — and Ray Rice is a great example, Greg Hardy is a great example. Sue, sue, sue, sue, sue and pretty soon you walk back the suspension, you walk back what it says in your policy.

So part of it is stick with your policy. The NBA should borrow one. But they should have some teeth instead of just constantly being willing to acquiesce when a lawyer gets in the room.

I also think we have a role to play. So sort of like, a lot of political pundits are talking about “If you want to change things, go out and vote.” If you want to change things, vote with your feet, vote with your pocketbook.

And there’s a lot of good data on this. The reason leagues don’t hold players accountable is because they are still money machines. People will still buy a ticket, buy a jersey and pay to see someone play.

If we stopped doing that and it stopped being lucrative, I can virtually guarantee that teams would start to hold people accountable because it would be in their financial best interest to do that.

MARK BRODIE: Angie, I want to ask you about the idea of, quote unquote, “letting the criminal justice system play out,” that process versus leagues taking action. Because it seems as though when these kinds of things happen, one of the reactions you often hear from team officials, league officials, whomever is, “We’re going to let the criminal justice system, we’re going to let the legal process play out and then we’ll figure out what we’re going to do as a result of that.”

I’m curious what you make of that response, and how should teams and leagues deal with the idea that there might be legal repercussions for the action in addition to whatever it is that they want to do with their player?

ANGIE HATTERY: This is part of what I meant when I said a few minutes ago that it’s a privilege, not a right. The criminal legal system is about rights, right? And if someone is convicted of a crime, we take away some of their legal rights, their civil rights, we take away human rights. We lock people up, we put them on probation, we make them wear ankle bracelets. And that requires a very strict standard of evidence because we are removing people’s rights.

Suspending someone from their job — often with pay — is a is a privilege. It’s not a right, right?

So basically, I think when league owners and coaches say, “Oh, we’re going to wait and see what happens,” they’re just kicking the can down the road. And they’re hoping that nothing will happen in the criminal legal system and then they won’t have to do anything.

As opposed to what happens in lots of other cases in lots of other jobs. I were facing criminal charges, the University of Delaware might put me on administrative leave before there’s any action, and then correct it if it turns out that I was innocent, or it couldn’t be proven that I had done whatever I was being accused of.

Sports works in the opposite direction. So I think it’s a moment for courage on the part of leagues who have the right to suspend a player.

MARK BRODIE: Angie Hattery is a professor of women and gender studies and co-director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Gender-Based Violence at the University of Delaware. Earl Smith is a professor and sociologist at the University of Delaware and a research scientist at the Center.