Apparently one of the biggest employers of African American athletes in the country is “racist” because one black player can’t find a job, and the whole country is racist for allowing it.
At least that is what Seattle Seahawks defensive end Michael Bennett said, citing anti-American former San Francisco 49ers second-string quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s inability to find a team to pick him up this year.
Kaepernick, who spent the whole of last year railing against the U.S.A. at every opportunity, declared his free agency for the start of the 2017 season. Even though he promised to drop his ever-present anti-American protests on the field, no team picked him up for this season.
The national anthem-hating Kaepernick’s inability to find a berth for 2017 has now spurred the Seahawks’ Bennett to claim the NFL and the country are just a bunch of “middle American” racists.
“I think the league is built on middle America, and most of the middle of America is predominantly a white crowd,” Bennett said Wednesday. “That’s just the truth of it. I think race is not something that the NFL wants to be a part of or get behind. But the league is predominantly African-American.”
How the 2-time Pro Bowl player doesn’t see a disconnect between his claim the NFL is racist even though it is “predominantly African-American,” is anyone’s guess. Further, how can “middle America” be filled with foaming at the mouth racists and still be fans of an NFL that is “predominantly African-American”? Logic apparently isn’t Bennett’s thing.
The player continued, according to ESPN, saying, “So the issue that he’s dealing with is what we’re all dealing with. We all come from the inner city, or we’ve been a part of communities where we felt like we’ve been judged because of the color of our skin or who we like or if a woman—any issue to deal with. We’ve all been dealing with it with someone in our family.”
Bennett’s tirade was essentially based on the fact that Colin Kaepernick has been unable to find a new team to take him on.
Kaepernick got one shot this year with Bennett’s own team, the Seahawks. The Hawks, though, took a pass on the passer. It is probable that the team was never interested in the anti-American protester in the first place because the invitation only went out after a Seattle politician published an open letter demanding that the team consider the former 49er.
Seahawks coach Pete Carroll ended up going with the less experienced Austin Davis, leaving Kaepernick out of the game for 2017.
Bennett, though, thinks he knows why Kaepernick is on the outside looking in. It isn’t because he spent a year saying how much he hates America and Americans. No, it’s because all, ya’ll are racists.
“Obviously, there’s the elephant in the room why Kaepernick isn’t signed, and most people know why,” the Super Bowl champion said.
Still, Bennett was on to something with another comment he made.
“I think race and politics in sports is something people don’t want to hear about, nor do people want to be a part of,” he said.
Yes. Stick to sports, won’t you?
Still, the whole claim that the NFL is racist is not born out by the facts.
First of all, the NFL is almost 70 percent African American. It is also a business where the average rookie salary is $365,000 a year, a number that goes up by tens of thousands every year the player stays signed to an NFL team. It is also a league where the average player’s salary is about $1.9 million annually.
The NFL has created more black millionaires than any institution in the history of the world. But, if the league is built on racist white people, as Bennett claims, then the NFL achieved that record with white people’s money and with white people’s full participation.
And that isn’t even to mention the many millions of white fans who spend millions a year to buy merchandise dedicated to black players.
Yet, the NFL is a sports league that is racist, unfair, and discriminatory to blacks?
Money aside, was America or the NFL racist when it allowed Michael Vick back into the league after his convictions for animal cruelty? How racist was the league back in 1998 when it let Leonard Little continue his career after he thoughtlessly and selfishly killed a mother of three through his own drunk driving negligence?
How is all that any evidence of racism?
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.
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