The NFL off-season is heating up
as we approach April and the 2017 NFL
draft. However, before the draft even gets here and we find out where the
next stars are going. NFL teams are currently locked in on trying to make their teams better through
free agency. One of the most interesting free agents this year,
is interesting not because of how good he is on the field. He is not the most sought after free
agent that teams are
lining up to spend big bucks to secure, even though he plays at arguably the most important position in football the
quarterback. No Colin Kaepernick is
the most interesting of all the
free agents because of his stand or lack of standing as the case was for the National Anthem. Kaepernick who has played 6 seasons in the NFL at quarterback
for the San Francisco 49ers is an average player at best. In his 6 seasons he threw for just over
3,000 yards twice in
his career. He made bigger headlines by choosing
to take a stand and become a hero of the Black life’s Matter
movement by refusing to stand for the American National Anthem before games. Why did Kaepernick do this? He stated
“because
he could not stand for an anthem for a country whose police officers were
killing black people.”
Some
people praised Kaepernick for this, stating his notoriety as a NFL player helped
bring more attention to the problem and kept it in the national spot light thus
keeping it in the consciousness of the American public. The question for Colin though is this was it worth it? Did it really
change anything in the long run? Should he be seen as a hero for this
action? Does the Black lives matter movement see him as a hero and a civil rights patriot like Martin Luther King Jr.,
Malcolm X , Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman, and Frederick Douglas to name a few? Or is he now just a guy who
refused to stand for the National Anthem and subsequently took his last kneel down as a NFL player? Free agency has been open for
almost a month now and currently there is no movement on a team being
that interested in Kaepernick. Now this could be because he did not
start last year and has been an average quarterback his entire career! Or it could be that even though he
presumably would be a pretty good back
up that teams could get cheap, no one is willing to take
the chance and face the media distractions he possibly comes with. If people remember during the
Presidential campaign even now President Donald Trump along with
the right took shots at Mr. Kaeperknick. Can you image a team having not even their starting
quarterback but their backup quarterback being trolled by the leader of the
free world?
If and it is a distinct possibility that no one picks Kaeperknick up in
free agency. How ironic would it be that a
quarterback ends his playing career in the NFL because he went into the victory
formation and took a knee on his own on the sidelines and not out on the field
with his whole team? If
this does become the case I think Kaepernick himself, his fans, and his
critics alike have to ask the question was it worth it? Did it really make a difference? Did it really help further the movement or foster any meaningful change or did it just cost an average football player his career in the
NFL? Now
Kaeperknick has told the media, the owners and the public that he will stand for the Anthem this year. However, as of right now it looks like he might be standing for the Anthem in his
living room and not on the sidelines or the field ever again.
written by J. Mass
No comments:
Post a Comment