Jamal Murray, teaming up with All-Star Nikola Jokic, is an up-and-coming, young shooting guard with the up-and-coming Denver Nuggets.

In 2017, he was named MVP of the NBA’s BBVA Rising Stars Challenge after finishing with 36 points and 11 assists. Murray is again having a great season with the Nuggets and if the Western Conference wasn’t so packed up with talent, he would have had some serious all-star considerations.

What is Jamal Murray’s Race?

Leading the Denver Nuggets in scoring this season, the confident Canadian guard is having a career year. As the 22-year old guard continues to improve, his visibility will also grow. And with that increased scrutiny on his game, people will be more interested in every aspect of his life off the court.

One of those questions we have in our society nowadays is one’s background; in other words their race. It’s seemingly assumed that Murray is at least part-African American or Caribbean-American, but his light-skin has many wondering whether Jamal Murray is bi-racial or multi-racial.

Jamal Murray’s Parents

In order to best answer whether Murray is mixed-race, let’s take a look at Jamal Murray’s parents. Let’s begin with his father Roger Murray as he was the parent that introduced his son to basketball. Here’s what Murray credited his father for his basketball success according to what was told to 9News.com:

“My dad put a basketball in my hand and I’ve loved it ever since,” said Jamal. “I had a little tykes net from Walmart and I used to play on it every day and then I got a net in the backyard and I kept continuing.”

His father, who is originally from Jamaica and moved to Canada when he was nine years old, has supreme confidence in his son from a young age. “From early on as a kid I knew if he put in the work the sky’s the limit. Early on I knew he could do it.” said Roger who grew up running track and field and also playing basketball. As Jamal grew up, the elder Murray coached Jamal on how to be mentally strong on the court, not just physically and athletically strong:

“We called (the process)’mental Kung Fu’. It’s basically just a way of controlling your body and focusing on your goal. Knowing what you can do and what you want to do and what it takes to get here. ‘You have to concentrate,’ ” Roger said. ” ‘If you really want to do something special, you got to make the sacrifice of all these things. We can’t lose track of ourselves.’”

That’s not to say his mother Sylvia, who didn’t have an impact. When we first put this information out, there was not much background information on Sylvia. We later discovered that the dark-haired Sylvia is Syrian; making Jamal biracial with Canadian nationality. The NBA is multicultural with Giannis Antetokounmpo, Nikola Jokic and Joel Embiid being some of the recent international superstars to win the league’s MVP award.

With Jamal playing a huge role for the champion Nuggets, he’s elevated his profile and that of those from Syria and other Arabic countries. This has made for more relevant sports betting, too. For example, you can read a YYY casino review in Arabic.

Jamal Murray is the 1st Arab player to win an NBA title. Jamal, whose mother is Syrian, made HISTORY. pic.twitter.com/wrG2fg8hTb

— Khaled Beydoun (@KhaledBeydoun) June 13, 2023

In any case, we’re not sure if Sylvia has any sporting background, but what we do know is that she ensures that Jamal (and younger brother Lamar) are well-rounded humans off the court.

“She’s always been helping me,” Murray said of his mother. “She helps me with my schoolwork sometimes. She would talk to me and send me messages when she’s at work telling me she loves me and bless my heart, stuff like that. She’s always had a positive attitude toward me. Very supportive of what I do.”

“I’m not there all the time. My dad spends most of the time with me for traveling reasons.” Murray continues. “She’s very supportive and takes care of my brother, holds it down at home.”

Though his life is very much basketball, you can tell that he appreciates his parents supporting him and holding it down as he keeps busy with his basketball career. You can tell that whatever Jamal wanted to do in his life, he was going to have a strong household. “Whatever my boy wants to do, I’m going to help him be the very best at it.” Roger said. “It happened to be basketball that he loved.”

All that love and support has paid off for Murray who coupled with Nikola Jokic to lead the Denver Nuggets to the franchise’s first ever NBA championship.