The profession that sells leadership and toughness as if it were a TED Talk was largely silent on Friday.
The profession that relies on the talent of young African-American men to keep millions of dollars flowing to lavish athletics budgets and bloated salaries took a pass on the national conversation around racism, police brutality and unequal treatment before the law.
The profession that drones on and on about becoming a man and doing the hard things decided to sit this one out.
On a day where athletes across many sports were speaking out, just a few prominent college football coaches tackled this painful moment.
The murder of George Floyd and the subsequent protests that have brought us — again — to this miserable place as a country is apparently too hot for most coaches to handle. The pressure to take a public stand about how we need to change as a society, as a culture, was left to the young people, many of whom are grieving and scared. The guys making millions of dollars? They were mostly sending tweets about recruiting, as if the entire concept of George Floyd wasn’t something that was hitting home at that very moment with every black player they recruited and promised to fight for.
Where’s their fight now? Where’s the truth? It certainly wasn’t on social media, where hardly any head coaches even acknowledged that something was desperately wrong in America.
Give credit to Oregon’s Mario Cristobal who tweeted late Friday after meeting with his leadership council, "We are responsible for using out voices for change. We are responsible for protecting those that don't feel safe or are afraid to share their perspective. We are responsible for creating a new normal."
Earlier Indiana’s Tom Allen and Georgia Tech’s Geoff Collins were the only Power Five head coaches who even acknowledged the searing reality. On a radio interview with Rich Eisen, Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh said it was “completely outrageous” and hoped charges were filed against all four police officers involved in the killing. Walt Bell, the head coach at UMass, recorded a somber four-minute video acknowledging the shamefulness of “having to ask my God to bring my 50 minority student-athletes back to me safely” because of the danger they face merely by being black.
With the national tragedy unfolding in his backyard, Minnesota's P.J. Fleck finally tweeted a statement Friday night, saying that Floyd's death was "indefensible, and I stand with the community in asking for accountability and justice" while also noting that he supported his student-athletes.
Other than that? The public face of college football coaches standing up for the players they represent was buried in the fear of backlash and the comfort of wealth.
The hollowness of that inaction, and yet the utter predictability of it, in some ways help illustrate why America struggles to break out of this cycle.
What we often find instead is that the true leaders are the ones who are willing to be told to shut up and play because their words have cut too close to the bone.
It’s the Missouri football team that boycotted in 2015 after the protests in Ferguson, Missouri sparked activism on campus around fixing racial injustice and inequality. It’s the Mississippi State players who called out their coach, Mike Leach, for tweeting a social media meme involving a noose that wasn’t intended to be racist but was highly inappropriate for a coach in a state where nooses recall the horror of Jim Crow. And it’s white players such as former LSU quarterback Joe Burrow or Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence, who said it better than any of us could.
“I’m siding with my brothers that deal, and continuously deal, with things I will never experience. The injustice is clear. and so is the hate. It can no longer be explained away. If you’re still ‘explaining’ it — check your heart and ask why," Lawrence said.
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There is little doubt that college coaches across the country today, whether they’re white or black, understand and acknowledge the hurt their players are dealing with. Deep down they know it could be any of their guys who ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong cop. They have been around enough black families to understand the systemic inequality in this country and the racism their own players deal with all the time, whether it’s on campus or online.
Where’s the rage? Where’s the call to action? Many will say they’re just a football coach, it’s not their place. Of course it’s their place. This issue — what young black men face in this country — is the reality of their roster.
There will be backlash, probably from some of the privileged white people who need to hear it most. That only makes it more important to speak up. Isn’t that the lesson we should have learned from Colin Kaepernick taking a knee? Had more and more been brave enough to listen to him and stand with him instead of allowing him to bear the weight of a pointless culture war, would we still be here today?
If systemic police brutality of black Americans is still too hot of an issue for influential coaches to stand up in large numbers and say very clearly what the believe and who they support, are they really the leaders they claim to be? Or are they faking it just enough to get the next recruiting class, the next contract, the next vacation home?
The silence is giving us our answer.
Follow USA TODAY Sports' Dan Wolken on Twitter @DanWolken.
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May 30, 2020 at 07:23AM
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Opinion: College football coaches mostly silent on conversation surrounding George Floyd, racism and police brutality - USA TODAY
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