https://youtu.be/hRw17Mnj12U
During his years playing for Duke at the college level, and perhaps to a lesser extent also during his NBA career, Grayson Allen has gained a reputation. An UNSAVORY reputation. A reputation as a quote-unquote dirty player. How much of this reputation was earned due to unsportsmanlike acts on the court (involving the entanglement of his feet with an opponent’s feet), and how much of it was just randomly assigned to him because everybody hates white guys from Duke, I don’t really know. I don’t care enough about college basketball to even pretend to care enough to try to know the truth.
But I would like to advanced the hypothesis that at least 15% of the hate directed towards Allen, and perhaps up to 35% of it, is because of his name. Grayson. That just sounds like an absolute douchebag name. Grayson. Say it out loud. Just hearing it boils your blood, doesn’t it? Grayson. If you imagine in your head a person named Grayson, you probably imagine that major-league doucher from your high school graduating class who never bullied you specifically, but was just a boisterous, rude, disrespectful asshole who was too dumb to shut his mouth but too smart to get into any real trouble. This mental projection of yours might be wearing a baseball cap backwards. He might also be well-muscled but not roided out. His parents have money and he’s not afraid to let you know about it. Girls like him more than they like you. You hated him, didn’t you? Didn’t you, my dear viewer?
What I’m trying to say here is, Allen probably deserves some of the dislike that gets sent his way, thanks to his past transgressions. But that dislike is unnecessarily amplified by his 100% d-bag name. People named Grayson generally deserve to get punched in the face, but that doesn’t mean we have to want to punch Grayson Allen specifically in the face.