Let's Not Overlook It: Colin Kaepernick Won Over Cowardly Owners

45's 'winning' got stopped by Colin Kaepernick. It took a while, but it happened.

Roger Goodell, almost in a moment of BTW, said it the other day: He deserves a genuine tryout, not one that's been conjured for him, but a real one, and an invite to a training camp. It might be a mere afterthought, but making it had some importance.

Kaepernick, if you remember, became the victim of the largest pile-on-after-the-whistle ever when he chose to take a knee during the national anthem in what he called a protest against police violence against black people--which, as you know, became a national protest that's still happening in some places. A few fellow NFL players joined him, but having started it, he became the focal point.

He found himself not playing much, then not at all, a pariah in the league for doing nothing more than expressing himself silently. Owners, kneeling prostrate themselves in front of 45, who twisted the protest to mean something against the troops (which is wasn't) but who of course got the lion's share of the attention in the days in which his credibility was a little greater than it is now, figured they had to clamp down on the expression. So they issued public statements to that effect. And stayed away from allowing Kaepernick, who has considerable skills--he personally wiped out the Packers in a playoff game not long ago, and came extremely close to winning the Super Bowl with the San Francisco 49ers--from trying out for their teams in free agency. It was an effective a conspiracy of silence as has ever been foisted upon any competent player, a collusion that bested anything 45 did with the Russians.

Consider also that 45 added great bluster to all this to make him look less than patriotic, when in fact the ability and willingness to protest unfairness is exactly what makes an American patriotic. But 45 intimidated the NFL owners, wimps all, and kept them from allowing Kaepernick to their training camps for three years. Excellent athlete that he is, those three years might have been the peak time that he could have contributed to some team, what with experience added onto his abilities.

The owners, of course, circled their wagons. They made a big point out of saying that each team was, in fact, privately owned, and they could make up the rules about team conduct as they wished. Never mind that they're private about the same way that Facebook is private--that is, in name only. Their success is tied to their millions of followers, and they want to have as many of them buy team merchandise as possible; excuse me, but that's not very private. Their main TV ad has had the following phrase: "Football is family." You might also consider that in most cases, the blackmail of public financing of their stadiums was necessary to keep these teams in their places.

But when 45 said that the protest was really all about the flag and the troops--mindless nonsense and gaslighting for which he is known--the owners kowtowed to that thinking and shrank into their respective corners. That was that. Nobody could register a protest without asking someone, or without hedging, in a way that was so vague as to be nearly meaningless. Never mind that it was a brief sideshow at best, that once done, the game would be underway and the gesture largely forgotten, like many protests elsewhere, remembered only as an expression of the right to protest.

It's stayed that way. Kaepernick declared free agency in 2017, and the owners froze him out. He filed a grievance with the NFL, which caused a settlement out of court; an admission, without publicity, that he had been wronged. The freeze-out has continued until, faced with a prospective player revolt upon George Floyd's murder, commissioner Roger Goodell said first, that players could in fact 'take a knee' upon the playing of the national anthem--since members of Congress were among the thousands doing so now--and, following up by a few days, that he hoped somebody would give Kaepernick an honest-to-goodness tryout. The first did not automatically mean the second, so Goodell had to spell that out. By doing both, he stuck a finger in 45's eye.

Jerry Jones, owner of the Dallas Cowboys, has replied by typically doubling down on the old ways, saying that if anyone wore the Cowboys uniform, they wouldn't play if they knelt. We'll see if he holds to that thinking after a number of teams allow their players to do so.

So Kaepernick won't be getting a tryout with Dallas soon. That's okay. If he gains a tryout and gains a spot on a team, that will be the icing on the cake. But he turns 33 in November, and he may be past his prime. He has the coronavirus to deal with, too.

As a passer, he was always mechanical and erratic. But he could go on hot streaks and move a team as well as anyone. And his physical strength and running ability gave him a dynamic that nobody else could match. As a starter, he was always a risk and needed a great team around him. As a backup, he'd be exactly the kind of guy who would make any coach, and offensive unit, feel better. He could jump into the middle of a game and his team wouldn't lose that much.

For now, though, he has regained a status relative to anyone else who might want to be on an NFL team. He has weathered the storm. He has faced down a stupid, narrow, ridiculous president and the cowardly owners who chose to follow his lead. The final victory is his. Ironically, he owes it to the death of someone he never met and never knew, but that adds to the legacy of George Floyd.

If Kaepernick chooses to try out, I'll be cheering for him perhaps more than for the success of the Packers, who drafted a quarterback out of college to eventually replace Aaron Rodgers (so we won't be seeing Colin in green-and-gold, either). If he fails, so did the league by denying an excellent talent more chances to play. Psychically, Kaepernick is playing with their money.

But let's not ignore that part of this upheaval, too. Maybe it'll be no more than cosmetic, but a corner has been turned. The next player to protest something will be allowed to do so, no questions asked. Our country, at least symbolically, is a little freer for that, too.

Be well. Be careful. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.


Mister Mark