He is? Gosh, what on earth were the 49ers thinking in 2016 when they benched him for Blaine Gabbert?
Back in January of 1981, both teams playing in Super Bowl XV wore yellow stripes on the back of their helmets to commemorate the freeing of the American hostages from the US embassy in Tehran, and a huge yellow bow was attached to the exterior of the Louisiana Superdome. Yesterday, the former president of Iran trolled the NFL. (I wonder what Nike thought about that?) The 21st century is not working out the way I had hoped, to coin an Instaphrase.
On Monday, the new face of Nike’s 30th anniversary “Just Do It” campaign was unveiled, and NFL fans will have no problem recognizing him: Colin Kaepernick, who started the protest movement back in 2016, when he declared, “I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color.”
In early trading Tuesday, Nike’s shares dropped by nearly 4 percent, “the biggest intraday slide in five months,” Bloomberg reports. “Nike shares slipped as much as 3.9 percent to $79 as of 9:31 a.m. Tuesday in New York — the biggest intraday slide in five months. They had climbed 31 percent this year through Friday’s close.”
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Yahoo Sports’ Charles Robinson reported Monday that despite Kaepernick having a deal with Nike since 2011, prompted by “interest from other shoe companies,” Nike worked out a new, far more extensive contract with Kaepernick. The deal is a “wide endorsement,” Robinson reported, a “star” deal, which will include royalties. The former QB will have “his own branded line,” including shoes, shirts, jerseys, and more.
Hey, what about socks?
San Francisco 49ers quarterbacks Blaine Gabbert, left, and Colin Kaepernick (7) stretch during NFL football training camp, Wednesday, Aug. 10, 2016, at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco. (AP Photo/Ben Margot.) Click to enlarge image.
In the crowded marketplace of athletic apparel, presumably Nike’s overnight transformation from selling an apolitical product to “woke sneakers” for the SJW set is a brand strategy similar to the reason why late night TV aims hard left, as described by Robert Tracinski of the Federalist:
This is also my theory about the big entertainment awards shows like the Oscars and the Emmys. If the big, broad, general audience you used to have is gone, and deep down you think it’s never coming back, then why not make a harder bid for the loyalty of the smaller audience you’ve got left? In a time when the entertainment industry is (or thinks it is) a one-party state with no dissenters, you had better echo that politics back to your base.
What were once cultural institutions with a broad, bipartisan audience are becoming niche players with a narrow fan base. They no longer view partisan politics as a dangerous move that will shrink their audience. Instead, they’re using partisan politics as a lure to secure the loyalty of their audience, or what is left of it. Not that it’s going to work over the long term, because people who want to have their biases confirmed will just watch the five-minute YouTube clip Chris Cillizza links to the next day.
And no doubt, as with ESPN’s own descent into a collective of SJWs with an occasional passing interest in sports, Nike decided to listen to the loudest voices on social media, rather than football fans at large:
They may have also helped sell quite a few more copies of Clay Travis’ new book, due out later this month, whose title derives from a famous quote by the man who has sold warehouses full of Air Jordans for Nike since the mid-‘80s: Republicans Buy Sneakers Too.
As Travis notes on Twitter, “Nike is also the official shoe of the NFL. You talk about a major ‘Fuck you,’ to the league on the week the NFL season starts. Holy crap.”
I knew that last year’s player/owner solidarity in response to the President’s remarks, with vivid images of owners kneeling and locking arms with players, would never last. The owners’ personal and business interests—and the braying they heard from fans, sponsors and networks—would soon lead to a push for players to “stick to sports,” evoking a tension that still lingers upon the mention of Kaepernick’s name. The Seahawks episode crystallizes what teams are thinking, in so many words: We will only employ you to be a football player if we know we are not employing you to be an activist.
Does Kaepernick actually want to be signed? Unless he delivers Johnny Unitas-level talent to whoever he plays for, actually suiting up and riding the pine each week as a backup, or a return to his mediocre performance during the 49ers’ 2-14 season in 2016 would be anti-climactic. Kaepernick has become the athletic equivalent of Michael Moore’s deception in his first movie, Roger & Me.Then-General Motors CEO Roger Smith had met with Moore — reportedly twice — during the shooting of his agitpropumentary, but Moore wouldn’t have a movie if he actually included that footage. Similarly, Kaepernick needs to remain permanently off the gridiron, to keep his uber-woke SJW pose alive.
If NFL owners are understandably reluctant to sign up for the Kaepernick sideline circus, it’s curious that the left, which loves nothing more these days than to deplatform and blacklist conservatives, seems rather antsy when their new rules are applied to one of their own. Back in 2014, Randall Munroe, who draws the popular online cartoon “xkcd,” created this image, thus wiping out the morality behind 50 years of Hollywood blacklist movies:
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): I don’t quite agree with this. Theres protection under the First Amendment, which applies against government, and then there’s the broader societal idea of “free speech,” which comes into play regardless of legalities. It used to be considered uncool to go after someone’s job for their opinions, and uncouth for an employer to give in to such demands. I wish we lived in that world today, but I agree that we don’t.
UVA’s Darden School of Business is at the forefront of popularizing a new, cutting edge business model: antagonize your best customers. Turning the laws of commerce on their head, Darden professor Morela Hernandez and MLB candidate Joseph (Sonny) Siragusa, are arguing that, long-term, flipping off America is a growth industry.
That hasn’t worked out very well for the Post’s bottom line, as Jeff Bezos purchased the newspaper in 2013 for about what he’s been rumored to spend to acquire the former cast and producer of the BBC’s Top Gear series to create Amazon Prime Video’s Grand Tour car series. And speaking of Bezos, in case Kaepernick’s career as chief wokesperson (sorry) in the NFL’s front office doesn’t work out, presumably, the Post will send a resume for him over to Bezos’ desk, right?
JUST BECAUSE COLIN KAEPERNICK IS A POSTURING FOOL DOESN’T MEAN THERE ISN’T A PROBLEM WITH POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY: “Cleveland police officer: I shot suspect, killing him, after he declined to get out of car, reached for gun. Witnesses: The suspect was kneeling on the ground with his hands up when the officer shot him in the back of the head. Jury: Excessive force. District court: Pay $4 mil. Sixth Circuit: Affirmed. (The officer is still on the force.)”
SAVING PRIVATE KAEPERNICK. Or, Dispatches from the Intersection of the JournoList and the Memory Hole:
Found via Stephen Miller, who tweets, “journos dunking on [Lahren’s Photoshop] seem to forget different they made the exact same comparison with Antifa.”
Former San Francisco 49er Colin Kaepernick took his woke SJW act to Alcatraz Island Thursday to take part in what has become an annual event among Native American activists: the Alcatraz Indigenous People’s Sunrise Gathering, also known as “Unthanksgiving Day.”
Kaepernick really does sound like an escapee from a Tom Wolfe novel these days. But the Alcatraz detail is the point where Wolfe would say to himself while typing, “There’s no way I can put this into my next novel — no one would believe it could be true.”
Jaren Stewart, a college junior at Clemson University in South Carolina, has found himself at the center of a campus-race-and-sexual-assault-fiasco.
Stewart is the sitting Vice President of Clemson University’s Student Government Association [SGA]. He made national news because he faced impeachment for allegations of voyeurism and trespassing during his time as a resident assistant (RA).
According to an illegally leaked incident report filed last spring, Stewart, who is black, entered students’ residence without permission and stole food and cleaning supplies. And it gets worse: Stewart allegedly “would enter…while women were changing their clothes” and refused to leave when asked.
Stewart maintains that the complaints against him are “exaggerated.” The embattled VP said that racial animus at the South Carolina school triggered the impeachment controversy. And that the report that detailed his alleged misconduct was leaked in retaliation for his refusal to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance at a meeting of student senate. In an interview with the Anderson Independent Mail Stewart was defiant:
“This is a social lynching…There’s a deeper systemic issue in which people are choosing what they want to hear, choosing what they want to believe exists and that’s why sitting for the pledge was so important,” he said.
But Clemson SGA senators said that the question before the governing body is one of fitness, not race. Stewart “abused his power” as an RA when he violated his female residents’ privacy.
Others have speculated about why the university was and remains tight-lipped about the damaging accusations, or why Stewart didn’t receive a harsher punishment for his misconduct. According to USA Today, school officials suspended Stewart from residential duties for eight-days and he was not invited to return to the program this fall. He was also issued a no-contact order.
There are other reasons to doubt Stewart’s “Jim Crow” explanation: under the guidelines set in the infamous “Dear Colleague” letter in 2011, Stewart’s actions were plainly sexual harassment. And if we consider reports that black male students are disproportionately sanctioned for sexual misconduct, he should consider himself lucky he wasn’t expelled.
When Mr. Kaepernick began protesting the national anthem, the Times ran a few opinion pieces but refrained from staking out an official position. That changed after Donald Trump weighed in. At a Friday night rally in Alabama last month, the president asked: “Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now?’ ”
In response, the Times blitzed. A Sept. 24 editorial called “The Day the Real Patriots Took a Knee” asserted the president’s remarks about the flag and players were yet more evidence of his disregard for “the legitimate and deeply felt fears and grievances of minority Americans.”
It piled on, accusing Mr. Trump of “implying that players give up their right to free speech when they put on a uniform.” For good measure, it went on to impugn Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin for suggesting “players should keep their mouths shut in the workplace.”
We get it: Employers have no right to restrict their employees’ speech.
But one tiny question: Why do Times reporters not enjoy this same right?
The obvious action is for Timespeople to revolt en masse against Dean Baquet, their editor, for his recent clamping down their wokeness on social media. Fight the systemic oppression inherent in the system!
CBS WALKS BACK REPORT THAT KAEPERNICK WILL STAND FOR THE ANTHEM IF HIRED. Great journalisming from CBS: Jason La Canfora, the CBS sports journalist who interviewed Kaepernick is now tweeting, “Standing for Anthem wasn’t something that I spoke to Colin about sat. I relayed what had been reported about him standing in the future…” (ellipses in original).
If this reporter spent several hours talking to Kaepernick it’s hard to believe the elephant in the room wasn’t discussed. LaCanfora seemed pretty clear when he said “He’s not planning on kneeling” and “he’s planning on standing.” If they never talked about that.
I haven’t seen video of LaCanfora’s explanation yet, but this is a pretty big screw up, if it is one. It seems more likely to me that he was actually told those things by Kaepernick or his agent or someone but was asked not to report it. I’m guessing he got a call after his segment (above) aired.
In any case, Colin Kaepernick is a political extremist. He’s already made clear once that politics is more important to him than football. Even if he did make such a promise behind the scenes, why would a team take his word? Even if he does drop the anthem protest, there are lots of other ways he could continue to politicize his job (though probably few as counter-productive). Maybe some team wants his drama but it’s hard to see how the NFL as a whole benefits from it.
Nessa Diab, Kaepernick’s girlfriend, is also denying the report. Diab is currently a New York radio host who reportedly radicalized the former 49ers QB while DJing in San Francisco. During this past offseason, she issued a tweet that compared Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti to a slave owner and superstar former Raven Ray Lewis as his Uncle Tom. As Clay Travis of the Outkick the Coverage sportsblog writes in response to Diab’s tweet, “This is why Kaepernick is unsigned. Who needs this mess for a mediocre QB?”
After La Canfora’s report, Kaepernick retweeted this entry from TV/radio personality Charlamagne Tha God, which said that Kaepernick “never spoke to CBS,” but that he “bumped into” La Canfora in a hotel lobby:
And currently on Kaepernick’s Twitter account is thisbon mot:
CHRIS BUSKIRK: Kaepernick and Curry Pop the Sports Bubble. “Several new studies prove what we already suspected: Fans are leaving the NFL because of the players’ political activism that disrespects our country, its heritage, and its people. Sports executives such as CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus get it, too, but they’re caught in a crossfire that is only partly of their own making. . . . Sports have traditionally been a refuge from cultural and political controversy where Americans could come together and enjoy time with family, friends, and even complete strangers. Entering the stadium, they could check the cares of the world at the turnstile. That’s changed recently.”
Politics are ugly. If you let politics into your field, it will become ugly. You may think you can only let in a little bit of politics, the kind you think is pretty. But you can’t control that, and it will become ugly. The NFL, and ESPN, and many other institutions should have adopted a non-political stance, but couldn’t resist opening the door, and now they don’t like what’s come inside.
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