White Men Can't Jump - Plot

Plot

Billy Hoyle (Harrelson) is a former college basketball player who makes a living hustling streetballers who assume he cannot play well because he is white. Hoyle never downplays his skill to increase the stakes; it is the black basketball players' own assumptions that are at the root of the hustle.

Such a talented but arrogant player is Sidney Deane (Wesley Snipes), a star on the Venice Beach, California outdoor courts. He is humiliated twice by Billy in front of his friends, losing a wager. But he also recognizes a good thing when he sees one and immediately begins to think of a number of ways Billy can be useful to him.

Billy and his girlfriend Gloria Clemente (Rosie Perez) are on the run from out-of-state mobsters because of a gambling debt. A voracious reader, making note of obscure facts, Gloria's goal in life is to be a contestant on the television show Jeopardy! and make a fortune. Sidney's mission in life is to buy a house for his family outside the rough Baldwin Village, Crenshaw District neighborhood of Los Angeles. He talks Billy into a partnership and they hustle other players for money. But when they unexpectedly lose a game, it turns out that Sidney has double-crossed Billy by deliberately playing badly alongside him, making Billy lose $1,700 to a group of Sidney's friends.

Gloria is incensed at Billy's blowing his money again and is also suspicious of how it happened. On the way to Sidney's apartment, she tells Billy: "Sometimes when you win, you really lose. And sometimes when you lose, you really win. And sometimes when you win or lose, you actually tie and sometimes when you tie, you actually win or lose. Winning or losing is all one organic globule, from which one extracts what one needs."

Once they get to Sidney's and appeal to his wife (Tyra Ferrell) for fairness, Gloria agrees to share some of the money provided Sidney and Billy are willing to team up again for a major 2-on-2 outdoor tournament. While they bicker incessantly, Sidney and Billy do win the grand prize of $5,000, largely due to Billy's ability to disrupt his opponents' concentration. Billy's most notable claim is that he is "in the zone," a state of mind in which nothing can get in his way. Sidney is pleased with the outcome, yet he cannot help mocking Billy about his inability to slam dunk. "White men can't jump," he notes. Billy claims that dunking the basketball is unnecessary grandstanding, while expressing a belief that black guys like Sidney would "rather look good and lose than look bad and win."

Billy insists that he can indeed dunk but Sidney clearly disagrees. Infuriated, Billy claims he is willing to bet his share of the $5,000 on his ability to dunk. Sidney accepts and gives him three chances. Billy fails, losing his share. When he tells Gloria, she leaves him. One of Sidney's friends works as a security guard at the TV studio that produces Jeopardy!. He agrees to get her on the show, if Billy can sink a hook shot from beyond the half-court line, which he does. To begin, Gloria stumbles over sports questions (notably naming Babe Ruth as the NBA's leading rebounder), but makes a comeback with a pet topic, "Foods That Start With The Letter 'Q' ". She wins $14,100 on her first episode. Gloria and Billy get back together.

Billy sings Gloria a song he has composed to win her back. Everything in his world is all right again, but now it is Sidney who suffers misfortune and needs a favor. He and his family are burglarized and become more desperate for money. Billy is supposed to get a steady job and settle down, but Sidney needs him to play basketball for money again and use his share of Gloria's take. Gloria warns that if Billy gambles with her money "we are through." Billy feels he must honor the obligation he owes Sidney for getting Gloria on Jeopardy! in the first place. They play a final game against two hoops legends of the L.A. scene, "The King" and "Duck." In a very tight game, Sidney and Billy prevail, the winning points coming when Sidney lobs an "alley-oop" pass to Billy, who dunks it.

Returning home happy, Billy discovers Gloria has kept her word and left him for good. He is crushed. Then the mobsters who are after Billy track him down and he pays off his debts. Billy once again asks Sidney to set him up with a real job. Billy says that Gloria has left him many times, but that "this is it", and Sidney remarks "Maybe you two were better off without each other." As the closing credits are about to roll, Billy launches into yet another basketball argument with Sidney and they are right back where they began—but, this time, as friends.