Carter Bryant and the Sound of Silence

If the name Thilo Widder sounds familiar, you have a good memory! Thilo is a contributor at our Minnesota Timberwolves sister site Canis Hoopus, and he participated in the second round of Fraternizing with the Enemy with J.R. Wilco during their playoff series against the Spurs. He also enjoys contributing to other blogs, and we have the great honor of him providing this amazing piece on Carter Bryant and his contributions to the deaf community to Pounding the Rock. We hope you enjoy. -the Editors

What’s the first thing you think of when you think basketball? Do you see the sight of the ball dropping through the net? Can you just feel the excitement burst into your bloodstream, a memory turned physical with a moment’s notice?

Advertisement

Or, do you hear it?

Because I hear basketball. I hear its presentation when Mike Breen yells “bang.” I hear the sound of shoes squeaking up and down the court, of Mark Cuban’s speaker system bafflingly installed inside the hoop itself.

I hear it all. I live for it. It’s essential to how I have fallen in love with basketball.

But what if it hadn’t been? What if I, like thousands of fans, could not hear the game? Deafness continues to be a more and more common disability. Over 430 million people world-wide already deal with some sort of hearing loss with the WHO estimating that number to rise to over 700 million by 2050, approximately 10% of the world’s population by that time.

Advertisement

There’s an ESPN story about “Invisible Disabilities” faced by sports fans that has stuck with me many years after it was originally posted just about two years ago. There’s one section about a deaf fan, Amy Gomme, who said the following:

“These leagues, these teams are missing out on a new fan base, potential fans who would show up to games if the experience was inclusive enough.”

I wonder how Carter Bryant feels about that.

To be clear, Bryant is not deaf. Instead, he’s been molded by the community that still seems like such an afterthought to the NBA’s production. As a child in a non-hearing family, and a special advocate of Gallaudet University, a school for the…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/carter-bryant-sound-silence-225506032.html

Author :

Publish date : 2026-07-14 22:55:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.