Rodgers says Kap belongs!
ADD Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers to the long list of people who think Colin Kaepernick should be in the NFL.
“I think he should be on a roster right now,” Rodgers told ESPN the Magazine in its upcoming NFL Preview issues. “I think because of his protests, he’s not.”
In the story, Rodgers said he believes in and supports the anthem protests that Kaepernick started last year in response to racial injustice and police brutality. The protests have grown this summer with Kaepernick out of football as more NFL players, including white players for the first time, join the movement. While other white superstars like Tom Brady seem to avoid the topic or talk around it, Rodgers minces no words. His comments show he is very aware of what his black teammates and other players around the league are trying to correct.
Compare that with what Brady told Esquire last year when he said: “I always choose to stand and reflect, at a moment like that, on the blessings that I’ve had,” Brady told the magazine last year. “That’s how I choose to express how I feel toward the people that have sacrificed for us. I think we live in a wonderful country. It’s certainly not perfect. I don’t think any country is perfect. It’s our responsibility to do the best we can do to change the things we don’t like. I think that’s part of social responsibility, and everybody is going to do that in their own way.”
Last week, more than a dozen Cleveland Browns players demonstrated during the anthem in the largest single-game protest to date. The group included the first white football player to take a knee: Browns tight end Seth DeValve.
Rodgers told ESPN that he doesn’t plan to kneel for “The Star-Spangled Banner,” but said the protests are peaceful, respectful and positive. “I’m gonna stand because that’s the way I feel about the flag — but I’m also 100 percent supportive of my teammates or any fellow players who are choosing not to,” he said. “They have a battle for racial equality. That’s what they’re trying to get a conversation started around.”
Like other woke white players such as Eagles defensive lineman Chris Long, Rodgers believes his black colleagues have a legitimate AP concern and he’s trying to better understand what life is like in their shoes. “I think the best way I can say this is: I don’t understand what it’s like to be in that situation,” Rodgers said. “What it is to be pulled over, or profiled, or any number of issues that have happened, that Colin was referencing — or any of my teammates have talked to me about.”
Rodgers said he’s spoken to teammate Martellus Bennett, an outspoken social activist with his brother, Seattle’s Michael Bennett, about social issues. Packers receiver Randall Cobb said in the story that he and Rodgers often speak about it away from the field. In the end, Rodgers is empathetic to the challenges his black teammates face (“I know it’s a real thing my black teammates have to deal with,” he said) and in the story, he talked about his evolving view of the world. Cobb backed that up. “As we’ve grown closer, I’ve been able to give him the perspective of a black man who grew up in the South and opened his eyes to the challenges in my life,” Cobb said, adding, “Football is one of the things we rarely talk about when we’re outside the building.”