Basketball Wives Rundown

( I wrote this at the end of last season and never got around to publishing it. I will write another reflecting the updates.)

“You were a non – mutha – f*ckin’ factor b*tch!” E. L.

That my friends, was the most memorable, and razor sharp quote from this season finale of Basketball Wives by far. These shows are meant to entertain and many of them are staged and to be taken at face value; however, I love to dig deeper. Particularly when a reality series is casted with all ethnic women, I want to observe how the brown ladies come across on film; film that’s seen worldwide. What I discovered from Basketball Wives is that Shaunie, Evelyn, Jennifer, Royce, and Tami all carry characteristics which indeed accurately represent the ladies with brown skin. So I decided to write about all of them. (Please note, I did not see the entire season, so my insights on the gals are based on the finale and the few shows I did see.)

First up: Shaunie. She looks naturally pretty to me. Although, she wears a lot of make-up, she stills appears authentic, and real, with a cute short hair cut. In this season finale episode, Shaunie was relaxed and she had no issues with any of the ladies, her mind seemed elsewhere. To me, Shaunie represents the autonomy that black women can possess, she executive produces the show, she’s not really dating anyone (I suspect), and she’s looking out for herself at all times. I can definitely relate to her independence, and the matter in which she handles herself around the other gals, she is laid back, and so am I.

Evelyn (to me) is the prettiest gal out of the bunch, she has the nice body and the long golden light brown hair; however, she possesses a supreme, out-of-this-world attitude problem. She symbolizes, the essence of I-will-cuss-you-out-at-the-drop-of-a-hat, and don’t-let-my-beauty-fool-you kind of gal. When you look at Evelyn, you would think she was classy, beautiful, and well put together, but only a couple of those assumptions are true. Why? Because Evelyn will drop the f-bomb all day on someone when provoked, and become very disrespectful like her name was Latanishicka from the projects. This personality trait keeps her classless no matter how she carries herself. Therefore, Evelyn is the golden child of the “brown woman attitude”, an attitude that she needs to shed quick and fast, so her interior can match her exterior. Personally, I have battled with the “brown woman attitude” myself, so I can relate – but I’ve learned to keep it at bay unlike her.

Next we have Jennifer. She is very sophisticated, and has a sense of class to her. I think she has a level of mystic and striking beauty to me, she very unique from her eyes, nose, height, and voice- she’s different. Jennifer portrays herself as high maintenance and a little snobby, yet she has her ways of keeping her emotions in check.

Jennifer handled a very private matter (her divorce), extremely well on camera. I attribute that to the therapy she was receiving. I can only imagine the stress and heartache with that whole ordeal; so she’s definitely a strong woman. But! Jennifer’s flaw is she stands as great representative of a hater. She may have been dealing with some issues from her divorce, but all Jennifer did was throw salt on Evelyn’s growing relationship with Chad Ocho Cinco. That was very apparent in the season finale because she in a round about way, said Chad was wack. She had a stale reaction after learning about Evelyn’s visit with him in Cincinnati, and was not upbeat about it at all – jealousy! Jennifer’s “hate-ation” is common among all shades of women; moreover, I have hated on someone’s good news before, but nowadays, I just try not to be a repeat offender. Plus congratulating and being excited for another’s success feels much better than dissecting and diminishing it.

Royce! I love her. Royce has a young, innocent and unthreatening look about her. I believe this look enables her to penetrate more friendship circles than the rest of the gals. However, this same access has also been a thorn in her side. Evelyn threw some shade at Royce by accusing her of playing both sides of the court, since she remains in contact with the ostracized gals from their circle. But Royce always remains unaffected by the gossip shenanigans, none them can break her, she’s too confident and happy with herself, that’s why I like her.

The season finale shed more light on Royce’s meaningful relationship brewing with her dude Dwayne. She and Dwayne who I might add did the whole old fashion thing by asking her dad for permission to take their relationship to the next level (so sweet), make a cute couple. I get the sense that by her being in Orlando away from the Miami shenanigans, she’s able to do her own thing, and not worry about the “she said” stuff. So all in all, Royce is in high spirits, and has a normal life to me. If I had to choose who I wanted to be out of all the gals, it would be Royce. She has her loving family close by, her man, and she knows life is too short to sweat the small stuff.

But of course I save the best for last, Miss Tami. Miss Tami has a new duo every time I watch the show, and they aren’t all that great. I’ve always classified women whom switch their hairstyles every time you see them, as women with emotion and/or identity issues, and Miss Tami is one of them. I think the divorce from Kenny Anderson, and her being left to fend for herself with the kids, is the root of her issues. She is a well of anger, the kind of anger that weighs you down physically, and you can tell she carries that weight. I felt like Miss Tami wanted to be the Alpha female within the circle, the one nobody better mess with or else she’ll smack fire out you gal; which is all smoke and mirrors to hide her pain.

The season finale had to end with a bang, and the scuffle between Tami and Evelyn was it. Granted Tami was a 100% wrong to try and attack Evelyn physically, but I understood her beef with her. Not necessarily for Evelyn sleeping with her ex husband, but the fact that she was just now disclosing that info, and so matter of fact with it, like Evelyn didn’t give a crap. And since Evelyn is always ready to spit fire due to her massive attitude, she told Tami Kenny never mentioned her, and said it by stating: “you were a non mutha f*ckin factor b*tch!” Classless like I stated before.

There was no need for Evelyn to be that disrespectful to Tami, Tami was in tears after the scuffle, and truly empathize with her because she feels she cannot trust any of those gals, including Shaunie. Despite Tami’s tough, don’t mess with me stance, she should not have been told that evening, that was mistake on Shaunie’s part. Maybe that is why you could see Shaunie wiping tears from her face right after the scuffle. She set her friend up for ratings, that’s not cool, again I’m speculating.

In any case, I can relate to Miss Tami, I was damaged before because a relationship ended, and I was on edge around people until I was repaired. It was an unhealthy state to be in, and I hope Tami chooses to get better like I did.

Well let me conclude by saying this Basketball Wives season was like all the others: full of gossip and superficial issues made for television (the reason we watch); however, it also showed me that each of these women, Shaunie, Evelyn, Jennifer, Royce, and Miss Tami, all possess relatable, and accurate characteristics of brown women in my opinion. As a brown woman, I initially speculated that the show Basketball Wives was going to depict fake and corny ladies, ones who would be too painful to watch, and not representing ethnic women at all. Yet after a few episodes, I was drawn to the ladies, I saw past the Maybeline and designer accessories, I related to all of them, I grew fond of some of them. I’m glad they will have another season, and so I can enjoy them again.