On Thursday, the Washington Football Team announced it was retiring legendary safety Sean Taylor’s jersey before the team’s Week 6 game against the Kansas City Chiefs.
While most fans believe this was long overdue, there was criticism this was a PR move considering recent events involving the Beth Wilkinson investigation into the team’s toxic workplace culture. While Wilkinson completed her investigation earlier in the year, emails from former team president Bruce Allen over the last decade were leaked, costing Jon Gruden his job with the Las Vegas Raiders.
The NFLPA and many others are demanding the NFL release the emails, which the NFL is refusing to do.
So, when the news broke on Thursday morning the team would be retiring Taylor’s No. 21, the timing was suspect since it only gave fans four days’ notice of the event.
Washington released a statement apologizing to fans:
“We apologize to fans who would have liked more notice and will continue to share with fans ways we will be celebrating Sean Taylor’s legacy over the next month,” the statement read.
Statement from a team spokesperson on the timing of Sean Taylor’s jersey retirement: pic.twitter.com/zMZvwpbQEE
— Nicki Jhabvala (@NickiJhabvala) October 14, 2021
Team president Jason Wright also apologized.
We wanted to do something long overdue by retiring players' numbers. Months ago we planned for Bobby Mitchell and Sean Taylor to be the first two. Seeing the reaction, I'm very sorry that the short notice does not properly reflect the impact Sean had. President's Brief to come…
— Jason Wright (@whoisjwright) October 14, 2021
Former Washington player Ryan Clark, who now works for ESPN, tweeted he received an invitation for Washington alumni weekend back in September that was scheduled for Sunday.
Since people are wondering Tim Hightower reached out to me on September 22nd to invite me to the @WashingtonNFL alumni weekend. In his text he told me they’d be honoring Sean and his family. Which I assumed was the reason I got the invite since I hadn’t been before.
— Ryan Clark (@Realrclark25) October 14, 2021
It does appear Washington has been planning to honor Taylor all along. It is inexplicable it was not announced until the Thursday before the game. Once again, Washington fumbles something so easy — honoring its most popular player over the last 20 years — which should be something announced in advance.
Some things never change.