With much of the media’s attention on the NFL and its alleged blackballing of former quarterback Colin Kaepernick, ESPN failed to mention that Kaepernick did not act in good faith with the NFL on at least one occasion.
ESPN headlined an article on current NFL players’ take on Kaepernick, “Malcolm Jenkins: NFL won’t get it right until it specifically addresses Colin Kaepernick.” The article quoted several NFL athletes, including Malcolm Jenkins, a player active in social justice. Jenkins said, “I still don’t think [the NFL has] gotten it right. Until they apologize, specifically, to Colin Kaepernick, or assign him to a team, I don’t think that they will end up on the right side of history.” Jenkins is the co-founder of “The Players Coalition,” a social justice group comprised of NFL athletes.
But ESPN, in this article and in other articles, did not mention that Kaepernick and his camp agreed to hold a workout before all NFL team representatives in Atlanta, Georgia in 2019. At the last minute, after several representatives arrived at the agreed-upon location, Kaepernick canceled the workout with the NFL. He set up a workout with his camp at a different location and did not provide enough time for multiple team representatives to change their schedules to attend his private workout.
The NFL tried to provide Kaepernick an opportunity to work out before all league teams, but Kaepernick nixed the workout at the last minute. None of ESPN’s coverage acknowledged Kaepernick’s behavior and solely highlighted his protests in 2016.
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