When college athletes were #United
Pandemic gave many a chance to find their voice regarding safety.
On the first day of July, University of California athletes Andrew Cooper and Valentino Daltoso met over FaceTime to discuss their mounting frustration with how college athletic departments were handling their preparation to play football during a pandemic.
A few weeks before, 30 UCLA football players had put their names on a document demanding that the school guarantee the scholarship agreements of any player who chose to opt out to protect their health and safety. But Cooper, a cross-country runner, and Daltoso, a football player, were discussing something more radical — bringing together players from more than one school to pursue action. Quietly, the Pac-12 “We Are United” movement was born in Berkeley.
On the last day of July, the Pac-12, blissfully unaware of what was happening across the bay in Berkeley, announced a revised 10-game, conference-only football schedule.
Two days later, a group of about a dozen Pac-12 players put their names behind a manifesto written for the Players’ Tribune, which began: “To ensure future generations of college athletes will be treated fairly, #WeAreUnited. … Because NCAA sports exploit college athletes physically, economically and academically, and also disproportionately harm Black colleges athletes, #WeAreUnited.”
How’s that for easing into an August Sunday morning?
Chronicling college sports in 2020 is an experience I’ll never forget. Friends often asked me this year, “So what are you writing about with no sports going on?” The answer was, “Stuff that’s way more interesting than what I normally write about, actually.” So much about America has been laid bare during the pandemic, and that has been true for college sports.
There was no book on how to play football outside of a bubble while respecting a deadly virus at the same time. It was clear from the outset that the NFL and Football Bowl Subdivision of college football were going to do whatever it took to have their seasons. There was too much money on the line.
The advantage the NFL had was that its players are professionals with their own union to negotiate terms on their behalf. The NFL feasibly could enforce uniform health and safety standards among its franchises.
College football always was going to be a COVID-19 mess that mirrored that of the country.
Players are not classified as employees even though they are treated as such, and they do not have a union fighting for their interests. Plus, the NCAA does not enforce uniform health and safety standards as a general rule, leaving it up to the individual schools to figure out what should be the most important thing.
The #WeAreUnited players made demands regarding health and safety (protect scholarships, void COVID-19 liability waivers, enforce player-approved protocols); lavish spending (reduce “excessive pay” to Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott, administrators and coaches); racial injustice (direct 2% of conference revenues to support financial aid for lowincome Black students); and economic equity (cover medical expenses for six years after graduation, distribute 50% of each sport’s revenue evenly to the ath
letes who play that sport).
Were all of these demands realistic to achieve? Certainly not, but that wasn’t really the point of the exercise. For the first time, athletes from schools across a conference had organized, found their collective power and used their voice.
“We were told we would be playing at our own risk,” said Kassidy Woods, then a Washington State wide receiver who joined #WeAreUnited. “It just didn’t make sense. We were putting our lives on the line, and there was no mandatory testing like there is now. And so when Andrew and other people across the Pac-12 started talking to each other and we were hearing the same stories, that’s when I was 10 toes down with this movement.”
In the rush of the news cycle, you may have missed Woods’ tale. The day after #WeAreUnited went
public, he had a phone conversation with Washington State coach Nick Rolovich. According to a recording obtained by the Dallas Morning News, Rolovich told Woods, “That’s going to be an issue if you align with them as far as future stuff. The COVID stuff is one thing. But joining this group … it’s going to be different. If you say, ‘I’m opting out because of COVID and health and safety,’ I’m good. But this group is going to change how things go in the future for everybody, at least at our school.”
Woods announced he was entering the NCAA transfer portal a month later.
Most of the 19 #WeAreUnited players who pleaded their case to Scott in an hourlong call in August eventually joined their teams and played their seasons. The Pac-12 revived its fall season only to end up canceling 10 of its 36 scheduled games and stage a championship game with a second-place team from the North division, Oregon, when champion Washington did not have enough eligible players because of a COVID outbreak. The Ducks beat USC 31-24.
I tracked down Woods because I wanted to know how he felt watching it all unfold from his home in Texas. He said he had no regrets and was glad he had parents who taught him to stand up for what’s right.
“It’s really disgusting, to be honest,” Woods said of the season. “It just goes to show they care about making money more than they care about the athletes that make them the money. What’s so sad about it is athletes still don’t realize the power that they have, especially during a pandemic like this.”
Now averse to the moneyhungry FBS, Woods decided to transfer to Northern Colorado of the Football Championship Subdivision.
He should feel accomplished about his time in the FBS. It may feel like #WeAreUnited has gone dark, but its efforts helped the Pac-12 establish daily testing protocols and schools across the country guarantee scholarships for players who opted out.
“I’ve been talking to the #WeAreUnited leadership and the guys who made this all happen, and we definitely aren’t done,” Woods said. “This won’t be the last time you hear from us.”
I asked Cooper, one of the movement’s masterminds, on how he evaluates the work of #WeAreUnited.
“In the grander scheme, what we established in August 2020 is cementing in history that athletes shouldn’t settle for anything less,” Cooper said. “You have the right to an education, the right to a safe work environment, the right to your name, image and likeness. … The next step is a players association.”
Cooper pointed to the combined statement between #WeAreUnited and #WeWantTo Play that was tweeted by Clemson star quarterback Trevor Lawrence. It stated the goal to “ultimately create a College Football Players Association” that represented Power Five players. Lawrence’s coach, the old-fashioned Dabo Swinney, even said he supported a players association.
Of course, Swinney offered, “That’s different from a union. I will say that.”
Call it what you want. It was enough for Cooper to look back to that July 1 meeting and see success as the season rages on into the teeth of a surging pandemic.
“The fist was thrown in the air when Trevor Lawrence posted a graphic saying we need a players association,” Cooper said. “The simple act of coming together to do it was uncharted waters. We had no idea what was going to happen.
“That athletes came together and experienced the power of unity — that is victory.”