With the second week of NFL Football set to get underway in a few hours, three things remain true- Kap still doesn’t have a job, Zeke is still suspended, and fantasy football is as big as it has ever been.
I get why there are so many people pushing the idea to boycott the NFL this season, and the fact that the Miami Dolphins elected to sign an ESPN analyst to a lucrative contract over ‘Kap’ this summer only made things worse. That and the OJ robbery sentencing style suspension of Ezekiel Elliot are the reasons I cringe every time I set my fantasy lineup.
And while I fully agree that what is happening to ‘Kap’ is unfair, I also think it would do a disservice to far more black families if there is an actual NFL boycott. The NFL employs over 1,500 players and 70 percent of them are black. It is also important to keep in mind that NFL players don’t make as much as NBA or MLB players. So while boycotting would send a message to Roger Godell, because the world knows he needs to hear one, it wouldn’t be as effective as most would think. Think about some of the personalities currently in the NFL, or some that have passed through the league in the last few years, would you really want some of them jobless and idle?
Honestly, the NFL is structured in such a way that the players are at Godell’s mercy any way the cookie crumbles. And while it may seem like taking the easy way out, we may just have to take Kaepernick’s protest and the traction it has gained for what it is, because as long as football puts food on the table, people are going to watch, especially black people.
I think that there are many things athletes can do to bring awareness to their cause off the field that can generate a lot of buzz. I mean, there are a lot of things that happen on our jobs everyday that we may not like, but we don’t strike or boycott everything. You know why, we have bills to pay.
That is what Dez Bryant was trying to say recently in lesser words. While he may support Kaepernick, he still has to do his job. I think eventually a team will bite the bullet and sign Kap, but until then, I’ll still continue to support the other 600 plus black men that work hard and risk their lives and well beings on a weekly basis to support their families.
