The NFL has spent most of 2019 trying to back out of social justice issues of its own making, and none of the moves have gone well at all.
In February, the league settled collusion grievances with former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and safety Eric Reid. Both players believed that they had been blackballed from the NFL due to their pregame protests, in which they knelt during the national anthem. The financial terms remain undisclosed, but while Reid signed a one-year deal with the Panthers last September that turned into a three-year contract extension in February, Kaepernick remains unsigned by any team, with minimal interest from teams destined to use quarterbacks with far less of a résumé than Kaepernick could produce. The Nevada alum last played in the NFL in 2016, when he threw 16 touchdown passes to four interceptions despite various injuries, and San Francisco’s status at the time as one of the league’s worst offenses from a personnel standpoint.
In mid-August, at the same time the NFL was still feeling the sting of the Kaepernick settlement and continued blackballing controversy, Dolphins receiver Kenny Stills was calling out Miami owner Stephen Ross about his fundraiser for President Trump —causing head coach Brian Flores to publicly encourage Stills to say less about it—the league announced a partnership with rapper, entrepreneur, and activist Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter and his management company, Roc Nation.
It was announced that the partnership would have Roc Nation advising the NFL on a number of entertainment issues, including halftime entertainment for the Super Bowl. There was also the nascent goal of amplifying the NFL’s “Inspire Change” initiative, which is something most people probably don’t even know exists.
The NFL announced the Inspire Change initiative in January 2019, saying that the program would focus on “education and economic advancement,” “police and community relations,” and criminal justice reform.” It was announced that the NFL would partner with RISE (Ross Initiative in Sports for Equality), the organization co-chaired by Ross. RISE’s status among NFL players is obviously in a complicated place after Ross’ decision to hold a fundraiser for Trump and Stills’ reaction to it. (On Aug. 31, Miami traded Stills and offensive tackle Laremy Tunsil to the Houston Texans for two first-round picks and a second-round pick).
“With its global reach, the National Football League has the platform and opportunity to inspire change across the country,” Carter said in a statement. “Roc Nation has shown that entertainment and enacting change are not mutually exclusive ideas — instead, we unify them. This partnership is an opportunity to strengthen the fabric of communities across America.”
Stills, a three-time winner of the Dolphins’ Community Service Award and a man who once said, “Injustice to one person is injustice to all. If they’ll do that to Kap, they’ll do it to any of us,” represents a growing sector of NFL players who would like to see the league do anything important regarding social justice and social change.
Carter has his own REFORM Alliance, a nonprofit advocacy group he formed with rapper Meek Mill. The organization’s goal is to “dramatically reduce the number of people who are needlessly trapped in the system.” The idea is to do this by “changing the laws, policies, and practices that perpetuate injustice. [The] key to our strategy is changing hearts and minds to support real change.”
One of those “real changes” was a workout for Kaepernick in which all 32 NFL teams would attend. This idea, brought about by Carter and proposed to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, according to talk show host Dan Patrick, would ostensibly give Kaepernick a legitimate shot to show what he was capable of.
But from the start, the details made the idea look more like a league-authored sham than a real opportunity.
The workout was scheduled by the league for Nov. 16 at the Falcons’ headquarters in Flowery Branch, Georgia. Jeff Nalley, Kaepernick’s agent, was informed on Nov. 12 that he and Kaepernick had two hours to accept the NFL’s conditions: There would be no media present. The date would not be changed to accommodate additional time to prepare. There would be no list of the team representatives attending the workout.
As soon as Kaepernick’s team agreed to the terms, the league sent out an email to a large group of football media personnel announcing the workout.
“They didn’t give the 32 NFL teams a heads-up, but they gave the media one?” one source in Kaepernick’s camp told ESPN’s Howard Bryant. “Once they betrayed us on the confidentiality agreement, we knew what this was.”
The NFL Players’ Association found out about the workout when the media did.
As the workout loomed, Kaepernick’s team continued its request for an independent filming of the workout. This request underlined the lack of trust between the two parties; Kaepernick clearly believed that the league would spin the results of the workout however it liked, regardless of the result. There was also a schism about the language in the injury waiver the NFL wanted Kaepernick to sign that was different that the standard injury waiver; this agreement would force Kaepernick to abandon any future legal claims he might have regarding the workout. In other words, the NFL wanted Kaepernick to sign away any ability to file another collusion grievance if the workout turned out to be the publicity stunt Kaepernick clearly believed it to be.
In the end, Kaepernick took his ball and went elsewhere — instead of the Falcons’ facility, it was announced on Saturday afternoon that the workout would be held at Charles Drew High School in Riverdale, Georgia. Kaepernick arrived wearing the same “Kunta Kinte” shirt he wore at the deposition of Robert McNair, the late Houston Texans owner, when McNair spoke in March 2018 at a hearing for the collusion grievance Kaepernick had filed against the league.
It was a typical combine- or pro day-style workout in which Kaepernick threw about 50 passes to a group of receivers — Bruce Ellington, Brice Butler, Jordan Veasy and Ari Werts. Reid was also in attendance.
Kaepernick looked in shape, his mechanics clearly hadn’t taken too much of a hit from inactivity, and his velocity on deeper throws was just fine. He overthrew his guys on a couple of deep passes, but was more accurate when he adjusted his platform and put more air under the ball. Kaepernick also ran several boot-action rollout throws, which was a wise move, as he was always good throwing on the run, and several NFL teams have increased their boot-action palette.
On the simple slants and other angular routes, he showed good enough timing, and he was comfortable hitting his receivers in stride on the bootleg throws. He didn’t lead his receivers into weird places on screens and other short passes. You’d have to think that NFL teams would be interested in a guy who can get the ball downfield with this kind of velocity on post, seam and fade routes.
Kap's best throw of the night, without question pic.twitter.com/WtsgumqPrH
— Jonathan Jones (@jjones9) November 16, 2019
“It’s important that y’all are here,” Kaepernick said to a group of reporters and supporters after the workout. “Y’all been attacked for the last three years. Y’all continue to be attacked. We appreciate what y’all do. We appreciate you being here today. We appreciate the work you do for the people in telling the truth. That’s what we want in everything.
“I’ve been ready for three years. I’ve been denied for three years. We all know why. I came out here today and showed it in front of everybody. We have nothing to hide. So we’re waiting for the 32 owners, the 32 teams, Roger Goodell, all of them, to stop running. Stop running from the truth. Stop running from the people. We’re out here. Ready to play, ready to go anywhere. My agent Jeff Nalley is ready to talk to any team. I will interview with any team at any time. I’ve been ready. I’m staying ready, and I continue to be ready.
“To all the people who came out here today to support — I appreciate y’all. I love y’all. To the people that aren’t here, I’m thinking of you. I appreciate your support from where you are. We’ll continue to give you updates as we hear. We’ll be waiting to hear from Roger Goodell, the NFL, the 32 teams — we’ll let you know if we hear from them.”
The NFL’s response was deafening in its silence. Kaepernick received not one offer from an NFL team to talk, work out, or sign a contract. Jordan Veasy, one of the four receivers Kaepernick threw to at his workout, was signed to the Redskins’ practice squad in early December.
“I just felt, you know, what happened in Atlanta was unfortunate,” Giants co-owner Steve Tisch said after the fact. “It didn’t seem to be very well organized. And I just, I don’t know how it all sort of fell apart.”
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones agreed. “That situation from the get-go probably had a lot more, that wasn’t about football, involved in it, and consequently we got the results of that dynamic.”
The likelihood is that Colin Kaepernick will never play in the NFL again. Only a handful of teams attended the workout at the new location. The NFL will continue to throw talking points around and move the goalposts whenever the subject comes up, and it’s Kaepernick’s history and legacy more than anything else that will muddy and complicate any work for social justice the league ever tries to do, no matter how well intended.
The NFL already had a legitimate social justice activist in a prominent place. And instead of partnering with that activist, it did everything possible to deny his gainful employment and will continue to do so. As such, if you respond to any NFL initiative with a severe case of side-eye, it would be impossible to blame you. The NFL will no doubt engage in its own version of merchandising activism, with Jay-Z as a willing partner.
As has been the case with everything from the ban on black players from 1934 through 1945, to a shameful history when it comes to reassigning and marginalizing the efforts of black quarterbacks, to denying the effects of head trauma decades after those effects were medically studied and confirmed, the NFL has proven that it will not move from its petard on any major issue until and unless the financial and systemic pressures are absolutely overwhelming. The settlement with Kaepernick erased that pressure, and the NFL has no reason to go beyond that with anything but ham-fisted and ultimately empty gestures in an effort to re-frame itself as a newly “woke” entity.
Those who have studied the NFL, and those who have been set aside by its thought processes and policies know better.