Football

Baseball’s coronavirus outbreak is a cautionary tale for a league returning without sequestering players. It may be too late for the N.F.L. to change plans. More

The league has often focused its progressive efforts at employees, players and public displays. But the actions of team owners have undermined attempts at change. More

The N.F.L. and the N.F.L. Players Association have finalized the last key financial issues related to this season, paving the way for an on-time start to the regular season on Sept. 10.In the deal reached late Friday after a vote by the union’s 32 team representatives, the salary cap — or the maximum amount teams can spend on their rosters — will remain at just under $200 million per team this season. But the cap will have a minimum of $175 million next season. Any shortfalls in revenue next year will be made up by reducing the salary cap through the 2023 season.The owners also agreed to a player proposal to scrap all preseason games to reduce the risk of infection.The sides had already agreed on several measures to reduce the risk of infection from the coronavirus as teams return to camps, meetings and practices, including outlining who can be inside team facilities and daily player testing for the virus.But the owners and the players’ union had remained deadlocked on thornier questions, even as players began reporting to team facilities this week, leading some star players to start a public relations offensive on social media pushing for their concerns. Those included how much players will be paid if the season is shortened or canceled, and how to reduce the players’ share of the loss of revenue if teams do not allow fans at games this season. More

Washington’s N.F.L. team will retire Redskins branding and adopt a placeholder team name until it can decide on a permanent name, the organization said Thursday, weeks after announcing it would yield to pressure from sponsors and activists and drop the name it has used for nearly 90 years.“For updated brand clarity and consistency purposes, we will call ourselves the ‘Washington Football Team’ pending adoption of our new name,” the team said in a news release, adding that the logo would be retired by the start of the 2020 season in September.The team also said it would roll out an aesthetic that would reflect the direction of the new franchise as it changes.The team’s Twitter account and official site on Thursday took on the temporary name and logo, a large W, though images of original logo remained in some places and its web address using the old name remained unchanged.The team also tweeted a design for new uniforms, which featured its existing color scheme and a numeral on its helmet instead of the drawn profile of a Native American face.The team advertised forthcoming “Washington Football Team” merchandise, and on its website shared prototypes of the temporary logo, uniform concepts and field designs that included an N.F.L. logo at midfield. The end zones in its mock field design read “Washington Football Team, Est. 1932.”Team officials did not return messages seeking comment on Thursday. It was not immediately clear whether fans — if spectators are allowed at all during the coronavirus pandemic — would be allowed to wear merchandise with the old logo to games. It was also not clear whether the team would eventually change its distinctive burgundy and gold colors, a move sought by Native American groups and nearly 150 federally recognized tribes in a letter sent to N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell this month.The team is scheduled to open its season Sept. 13 against the Philadelphia Eagles.On July 13, 10 days after announcing it would review the 87-year-old team name and under mounting pressure from corporate sponsors, fans and Native American activists, the team said it would drop its logo and the name “Redskins,” a term many had long considered a racial slur.The team’s owner, Daniel Snyder, had previously been uncooperative in changing the team’s name, but said the new name would “take into account not only the proud tradition and history of the franchise but also input from our alumni, the organization, sponsors, the National Football League and the local community it is proud to represent on and off the field.”The name change came after weeks of national unrest following the killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis in late May, and as much of the country quickly moved to change historical representations that use racist symbols.Last month, the Washington franchise spent several days removing a monument and remembrances honoring its former owner, George Preston Marshall, from team facilities and its website. The change came amid pressure on the team to acknowledge Marshall’s resistance to signing and drafting African-American players and his decision in 1933 to name the team the “Redskins.” A memorial of Marshall, which had stood in front of R.F.K. Stadium, the team’s former arena, was removed by a city agency after being defaced.Last week, the team was once again in the spotlight as 15 women said they were sexually harassed while employed by the team. More

Michael Bennett, the standout defensive end who spoke out forcefully against racial injustice during his career, said he was retiring after an 11-year N.F.L. career, primarily with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Seattle Seahawks.“Retiring feels a little like death of self, but I’m looking forward to the rebirth — the opportunity to reimagine my purpose,” Bennett, 34, wrote on Instagram. “I have never been more at peace in my life.”Bennett, like his younger brother, Martellus, a tight end who last played in the N.F.L. in the 2017 season, never shied away from sharing his opinions. In 2017, after the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., Bennett was part of a group of players who began protesting during the playing of the national anthem to raise awareness of police brutality and other forms of injustice. But while most players knelt or raised a fist during the anthem, Bennett drew extra attention because he chose to sit on the bench.He was later joined by a white teammate, offensive lineman Justin Britt, who put his hand on Bennett’s shoulder in solidarity.Doug Baldwin, a Seahawks wide receiver who retired after the 2018 season, said Bennett was never afraid to share his opinions, often backed by data, in and out of the locker room. But he was also willing to listen to others who did not agree with him. At the same time, he followed unconventional paths, as when he chose to sit during the national anthem.“Obviously, he cared deeply about the same issues as we did, but he had his own way fighting and speaking out,” Baldwin said. “He was never afraid to express himself. Whether it was trying to bring people together or being divisive, his intention was to get people to look outside themselves.”Bennett’s protests were informed by his personal experience. In August 2017, Bennett was outside a Las Vegas nightclub when the police were investigating a report of shots fired. Two officers approached Bennett and eventually handcuffed him at gunpoint. Bennett later said that the officers had racially profiled him and used excessive force, including an officer kneeling on his back. The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department denied that its force was unwarranted.In 2018, Bennett was indicted on a felony charge, accused of assaulting an elderly security guard when he rushed the field after the 2017 Super Bowl, which Martellus won as a member of the New England Patriots. The charge was dismissed in 2019 because of a lack of evidence.He shared his views about racial inequality, police violence and athletes’ roles in protest movements in “Things That Make White People Uncomfortable,” a book he co-wrote that was released in 2018.In college, he said he was astonished at how white coaches tried to mold Black players in their image.Bennett said about his experience at Texas A&M: “We had white coaches, and they wanted the Black players to be the embodiment of who they were. They would tell us to wear our pants and shoes a certain way; this is what it meant to ‘be a man.’”He called out the N.F.L. for effectively banning Colin Kaepernick, the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback who began kneeling during the national anthem in 2016 but who has gone unsigned since becoming a free agent after that season.“The N.F.L. holds up as leaders players who have been accused of rape, violence against women, and even manslaughter,” Bennett wrote. “They’re right in front of us, playing quarterback and winning Super Bowl M.V.P. awards. I’d much rather call a leader someone who helps his community.”Bennett was signed by the Seahawks as an undrafted free agent in 2009. He was waived early that season and picked up by the Buccaneers, who moved him to defensive tackle.After four seasons at Tampa Bay, the Seahawks signed him again, this time to a one-year contract in 2013. He joined what was already the league’s most dominant defense, helping the Seahawks win their only Super Bowl championship that season in large part because of a strong pass rush and defensive backfield.Bennett was chosen to play in the Pro Bowl three times in his career. In 2018, he was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles, where he played one season.In 2019, he played with the Patriots and the Dallas Cowboys. Last October, the Patriots suspended him for one week, citing conduct detrimental to the team; Bennett said it was after a philosophical disagreement with his position coach.In the button-down, just-do-your-job world of the N.F.L., Bennett never seemed to shy away from asking questions and philosophical disagreements.“But if you don’t ask why, nothing, not a damn thing, is ever going to change,” he wrote. More

The Jets and Giants will play their regular-season games without fans at MetLife Stadium this fall, the teams announced in a joint statement Monday, nearly three weeks after Gov. Phil Murphy of New Jersey issued an executive order limiting social gatherings to 500 people. The teams are the first in the N.F.L. to decide to forego fans, and the revenue they bring, when the season begins in September.Both teams said in the statement that they would continue to work with the governor and update the status of a no-fan plan, if necessary.“We support Governor Murphy’s decision in the interest of public health and safety and, until circumstances change, both the Giants and Jets will play our games without the benefit of fans in attendance,” the teams said in the statement.New Jersey, home of MetLife Stadium, has seen a sharp reduction in the number of coronavirus cases in the past two months, and has been slower than other states to relax social distancing guidelines and closures after being one of the hardest hit states at the outbreak’s onset in March. Gov. Murphy’s order to raise the number of people allowed at public gatherings to 500 from 250 came in early July.Rutgers University will also abide by the limitation this college football season but will allow 500 fans to attend its home games, the school said in a statement Monday.Neither N.F.L. team’s training camps and practices will be open to the public. The Jets will warm up for their training camp in Florham Park, N.J., while the Giants prepare at MetLife at the end of July. In recent weeks, both the Miami Dolphins and Green Bay Packers also announced that they would hold training camps and preseason games without fans, but both stopped short of saying that they would not admit spectators at regular-season games.Season-ticket holders for both N.F.L. teams are permitted to transfer credits to the 2021-22 season or apply for a full refund. Other teams have either deferred all season tickets or announced plans for half-capacity stadiums, however none have announced a no-fan policy. Restrictions on gatherings in many states across the nation may make crowded stands impossible when the season begins on Sept. 10.But the N.F.L. has not issued any league-wide fan restrictions. Decisions on attendance are up to each team in accordance with guidance from state and local government officials and public health experts, a league spokesman said in an email.The season is expected to kick off on time despite an upswing in infections across the United States in recent weeks. The team owners and the N.F.L. Players Association are still negotiating safety protocols, but both sides agree that they want to play this season, safely.The Jets and Giants teams were two of 13 N.F.L. teams that Ticket IQ, which tracks sales, recommended fans wait to purchase tickets for given local coronavirus outbreaks. Still, the Jets and Giants may bring their audiences back to home games, should New Jersey crowd restrictions change in the coming months. And if they’re allowed to, experts say, fans will be there.“We’ve seen a lot of demand for events that are allowed to happen,” said Jesse Lawrence, the founder of Ticket IQ. “If the safety measures are in place, we expect that fans will come back.” More

The team owners and the players’ union are deadlocked on several questions governing coronavirus protocols, even as players are scheduled to report this week. More

The University of Texas at Austin said it would rename a building named for a racist professor, erect a statue of the school’s first Black football player and commission a monument to its first Black undergraduates. What’s not changing? “The Eyes of Texas,” a campus anthem with minstrel roots that student-athletes want abolished.Athletes at the university had called on campus officials to find a song “without racist undertones” in place of the anthem, which has lyrics that were in part inspired by the words of Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general.“‘The Eyes of Texas,’ in its current form, will continue to be our alma mater,” Jay Hartzell, interim president of the university, said in a statement on Monday.“It is my belief that we can effectively reclaim and redefine what this song stands for by first owning and acknowledging its history in a way that is open and transparent,” he continued. “Together, we have the power to define what the Eyes of Texas expect of us, what they demand of us, and what standard they hold us to now.”Replacing the song was among a long list of requests made by the athletes, who said that if their demands were not met, they would no longer help the university recruit new players or participate in donor events.On Monday, after the announcement was made, many athletes said they were grateful for the actions the university had decided to take.Caden Sterns, a defensive back on the Longhorns football team, thanked the administration on Twitter.“Great day to be a Longhorn,” he wrote, adding, “Looking forward to make more positive change on campus.”“These are great first steps!” Asjia O’Neal, a Texas volleyball player, wrote on Twitter, adding that she was proud “to be a part of the change.”“The Eyes of Texas” can be traced back to Lee and was performed at minstrel shows in the early 20th century.Lee’s connection to the song goes back to William Prather, the University of Texas’ president from 1899 to 1905. In the 1860s, Prather was a student at Washington College, in Lexington, Va., while Lee was its president.Lee would always end remarks to Washington faculty members and students by saying “the eyes of the South are upon you,” according to historians.When Prather became president of the University of Texas, he invoked the phrase and changed it to “the eyes of Texas are upon you.”Students wrote satirical lyrics with the phrase and set them to the tune of “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad.”A university quartet first performed the song around 1903, at a minstrel show at the Hancock Opera House in Austin, where the singers are believed to have worn blackface.Edmund T. Gordon, a professor in the University of Texas’ African and African diaspora studies department, who has studied and documented the campus’s racial history, said he supported the decision to keep the song in the context of the university’s mission “to foment teaching, learning and research in service of positive change in our society.” He added that keeping the song and explaining its origins would serve as a “constant reminder to our community that there were problematic aspects of our past that can and do continue to impact the present.”Last month, the athletes called on the athletics department and the university to take measures including creating a permanent Black athletic history exhibition in its Hall of Fame; donating a portion of the athletics department’s annual earnings to Black organizations, including Black Lives Matter; and renaming campus buildings, including one honoring Robert Lee Moore, a mathematics professor who refused to let Black students in his class after the university desegregated.The university agreed to rename that building the Physics, Math and Astronomy Building.The university added that it would “provide historical explanations within the building about why past university leaders chose to name the space for Professor Moore.”University officials said they would erect a statute for Julius Whittier, who joined the Longhorns in 1970 and became the team’s first Black football player, at Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium.Joe Jamail Field, which was named after a white Texas billionaire, will be renamed to honor two Black football players, Earl Campbell and Ricky Williams, former Longhorns and Heisman Trophy winners. That change was suggested by Mr. Jamail’s family, according to the university.The university also said it would use revenue from the athletics department to invest in programs that recruit Black students and students from underrepresented groups from Dallas, Houston and San Antonio.The university vowed to adopt a plan to recruit and retain faculty members “who bring more diversity to our research and teaching missions” and to expand a committee that oversees campus police to include more community members and a “broader range of students.” More