When National Football League [NFL] Commissioner Roger Goodell announced May 23 a new National Anthem policy, he contended he had unanimous owner backing. Goodell spelled out a new policy that all players on the field must stand during the National Anthem or stay in the locker room until it’s over. Goodell’s new policy didn’t sit well with players, contending the league has compromised their free speech rights as citizens under the First Amendment. Nitkpicking about whether the owners ratified the policy by a show of hands or actual vote doesn’t stop the arguments pro and con by NFL players, fans and front office. Faced with a 10% loss in TV viewership in 2017, Goodell, rightly or wrongly, attributed it to players taking a knee or sitting during the National Anthem. Other factors, like bad publicity from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy [CTE], also played a part
NFL’s Manhattan-based corporate office still contends with a lawsuit by 30-year-old former San Francisco Forty-Niner quarterback Colin Kaepernick for blackballing and racial discrimination for starting protests against police brutality and criminal justice reform. NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said the league’s “show of hands” was comparable to a formal vote, despite abstentions by at least two of the 32 NFL owners. Oakland Raiders’ owner Al Davis Jr. abstained from voting, refusing to give his rationale to the press. “ I haven’t changed my mind,” Davis told ESPN’s Paul Gutierrez. Requiring players to stand on the field during the National Anthem or face team fines opens a can of worms, especially for players receiving treatment before games, unable to show up on the field before games. Goodell wanted to paint his new policy as unanimous, when it didn’t consult the NFL Players’ Union.
Specified in the National Basketball Association’s [NBA’s] Collective Bargaining Agreement, all players must be on the court and stand during the National Anthem. While you’d think the same protocol would apply to NFL players, the policy was not part of the current CBA. With the NFL Commissioner and owner’s trying to correct holes in the CBA making part of NFL corporate policy, it doesn’t sit well with National Football League Players’ Association Executive Director DeMarcus Smith. Smith thinks owners want to stop any drag on their cash-cows caused by players political statements during the National Anthem. Smith backs players’ rights to activism on the NFL stage, no concerned whether or not it hurts owners’ bottom lines. Today’s Anthem protests by NFL players stemmed originally from Kaepernick taking a knee to protest racial injustice in communities of color.
Goodell decided to place the National Anthem policy in the NFL’s operating manual, deliberately outside the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Putting the policy in the operation manual makes it look like players can no longer protest without violating a NFL policy. But the CBA is the last word in all sports leagues and union-workplaces requiring owners to negotiate in good faith, not implement arbitrary policies when it comes to players or workers’ rights. When Kaepernick decided to make political statements about longstanding racial inequalities, it morphed his role as quarterback into political activist. If you consider the NFL platform a private industry, then Kaepernick decided to use all the league’s publicity to registers his complaints. Other players have followed suit, believing the no corporate league office can stop any players from expressing political opinion.
Taking about the First Amendment and Free Speech rights in corporate settings muddies the water from the public forum in which it applies. No one working in a corporate setting for a private enterprise can expect to opine on politics without political repercussions. That’s why a CBA is so important to setting the parameters of free speech in a corporate setting. Threatening teams with fines for players’ choosing to speak their minds makes zero sense. No owner can muzzle players or confine conversations purely to football. Speaking yesterday at a sports league award ceremony in Los Angeles, 56-year-old NBA Commissioner Adam Silver specifically encouraged NBA players to talk about more than basketball, a direct slap in Goodell’s new policy. Unless the NFL policy is part of the CBA, its bypassing players’ input, something that doesn’t sit well with players impacted by the policy.
Goodell and the NFL should have left good-enough-alone instead of instituting a new policy bound for more controversy. NFL players don’t appreciate heavy-handed policies, denying players their civil rights. Whether the general public likes the protests or not, they’re capable of changing the channel, tuning into something else. “I can no longer ask our team to say something while they are in a Raider uniform. The only thing I can ask them to do is to do it with class. Do it with priced. Not only do we have to tell people there is something wrong, we have to come up with answers. That’s the challenge in front of us as Americans and human beings,” said Al Davis Jr. Davis sees no good reason to restrict players’ rights to protest, using the NFL platform or not. Goodell and NFL owners erred not consulting closely with the NFLPA before implementing a new National Anthem Policy.
