Did CNN Columnist Really Call NBA All-Star Weekend 'Black Thanksgiving'?

CNN created an online stir Friday evening after its homepage linked to a Sports story about "Black Thanksgiving," an apparent reference to this weekend's NBA All-Star Weekend.

h/t HuffPo

"Other folks have Tweetups. Black people have All-Star Weekend, or ASW," writes David Aldridge, an NBA.com columnist special to CNN.  "It's a national holiday, sort of."

ASW is the only time of the year that people call me. I don't say that to be maudlin, 'cause most of the time, I don't want people to call me. (Dirty little secret: I don't really like talking on the phone.) But they come out of the woodwork this time of year, because NBA players are royalty in Black America, and everyone wants to be near them. The old saying is that ballers want to be rappers, and rappers want to be ballers. That's really, really true.

To seal his racially based case, Aldridge quotes a (chomp down on smoking pipe and assume hoighty-toighty pose) academic scholar:

"Considering that the culture of basketball in a predominantly black league like the NBA is so strongly connected to African American culture, the NBA All-Star weekend has turned into a celebration of African American culture by extension," says Todd Boyd, professor of critical studies at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts.

Seriously?