More than a half-dozen NFL teams canceled or delayed practice Thursday, four days after a 29-year-old Black man named Jacob Blake was shot seven times in the back by a police officer in Kenosha, Wis.
The New England Patriots did not.
The Patriots opted to hold their training-camp practice as scheduled Thursday morning. It was a spirited session dominated by New England’s defense that featured plenty of trash talk.
But was staying on schedule — after players from the NBA and several other pro leagues boycotted games Wednesday — the correct decision? Veteran cornerback Jason McCourty grappled with that difficult question during a post-practice video conference with reporters.
“I feel like right now, myself and I know a lot of other guys I’ve talked to in the locker room right now, we’re just lost, man,” McCourty said. “It’s almost like a sense of hopelessness. … We cancel practice today, we sit around, we discuss race, we discuss what happened to Jacob Blake, we talk about what’s continued to happen in our country for hundreds of years, but then we go out and practice tomorrow. Nobody cares. I think for us, right now, we’re trying to figure it out.”
A visibly emotional McCourty spoke for more than 15 minutes about the hopelessness, confusion and sadness he and many of his Patriots teammates are experiencing in the wake of Blake’s shooting, which occurred three months after the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer that sparked nationwide protests.
McCourty said practicing can provide an escape for players, but that he feels “a sense of guilt” for being able to enjoy that benefit.
“It definitely makes it hard to show up (to work),” McCourty said. “We learn how to compartmentalize, and I think when we get out on the field today in practice, you get going and you’re a competitor, as well, and you get lost in football. I think sometimes, that can be a good thing because it allows you the freedom to go out there and just be who you are and do what you love. (But) I think as soon as it’s over, you’re right back to reality, and there’s almost a sense of guilt that, hey, I’m able to go out there and I’m able to escape what’s really going on out here.
“But for Jacob Blake’s three children who sat in the car and watched their father get shot seven times, where do you go to escape that feeling? Where do you go to erase that sight? Where do you go to deal with that type of trauma? It’s a feeling of guilt when you walk away, and that was probably the main thing that I was suffering from today — guilt that I get to walk into the building and I get to go play football.
“Because the reality is, I can be anywhere, and as soon as I’m out of the building and there’s not a football in my hand, I’m just a Black man on the street, and I look a lot like some of the men who have lost their lives, who have been gunned down in the streets. The reality of the matter is I’m blessed to be able to do what I can and to have this platform, and for me, I’m going to try to do everything I can to use that platform to help those who don’t have the ability to spread their voice that people will hear them.
“So, yeah, you’re definitely able to get away from it and to be able to love your craft and work at it and build as a team and all of that good stuff, but there’s a sense of guilt that comes with it.”
The Indianapolis Colts, New York Jets, Arizona Cardinals, Tennessee Titans, Chicago Bears, Green Bay Packers and Washington Football Team all canceled practice Thursday. The Detroit Lions did so Tuesday, with former Patriots Duron Harmon and Trey Flowers helping spearhead that effort.
McCourty was asked whether the Patriots planned to meet as a team to discuss Blake’s shooting and the broader fight against police brutality and racial injustice, as they did following Floyd’s death earlier this year.
“We’ve (discussed societal issues as a team) in the past, and we plan on doing that, but I don’t know,” McCourty replied. “I talked to Duron; I know they did that in Detroit. They kind of started it, and I thought what they did was awesome. Does it fix anything?
“When we cancel practice and we sit down and we meet and we talk, does it change anything? When we stay inside for the national anthem and then we go out there and we play in the game for four quarters and we entertain everybody, does it change anything? And I think that’s what I’m struggling with.
“We cancel practice and we sit down and talk. Does the Thursday practice just move to Friday? Does everybody write a story on Thursday that the Patriots canceled practice, and then tomorrow the headlines is ‘Cam Newton thrills at practice’? And then we just go on and we talk about that day — who’s out, who’s injured, who came back, who had an interception, who broke off a nice run? It just moves forward. It’s just like, ‘Yeah, that was awesome. They canceled practice. They did something. Oh, but they came out to practice the next day, and that’s what we’re going to write about and that’s what we’re going to discuss.’ “
McCourty referenced a virtual news conference his brother, Patriots safety Devin McCourty, gave near the start of training camp. In that call, McCourty declined to take questions and issued a lengthy statement that touched on numerous non-football topics, including education reform, healthcare inequalities and the death of Breonna Taylor. In closing, the longtime Patriots co-captain harshly criticized the NFL for moving up its deadline for COVID-related player opt-outs.
“I went on Twitter after that,” Jason McCourty said, “and the thing I saw most was ‘Devin McCourty bashes NFL and the opt-out date.’ None said, ‘Devin McCourty addresses Breonna Taylor’; ‘Devin McCourty talks about equal rights for everyone’; ‘Devin McCourty talks about voting.’ It wasn’t about that. It was about the NFL.”
McCourty said he feels a responsibility to use his platform to promote social change but that athletes should not be expected to have all the answers.
“I think for us as players, we’re lost,” McCourty said. “We don’t know why we’re practicing. We don’t know why we would not practice. We don’t know why we’d be preparing for games. We don’t know why we wouldn’t. We’re completely lost as Americans. We have no idea what’s the way to go. …
“It’s a struggle. Because there are moments I feel like, ‘Man, screw this. I’m not going out there to entertain anymore when I feel the way I feel.’ And is that the right thing? Does that do anything? Is that fair? It’s just been a ridiculous struggle.”
