As Detroit Lions fans, we are well aware that Matthew Stafford is not one to speak out on much of anything. Stafford does not have Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram (though his wife Kelly does) so we really never get to know what is going through his head.
Well, on Friday, The Players' Tribune published a nearly 2,000-word article written by Stafford which tackles racial injustice.
Here are a few excerpts from the amazing piece but to read the entire thing, which I highly suggest, please click here.
http://gty.im/1172255281
Listen, I love the game of football.
I love it.
But there are some things that are way more important than football right now.
Yes, this NFL season just kicked off, and nobody is more excited about that than me. But we can’t just move on from the issue of racial injustice and use sports as a distraction.
We can’t just stick to football. Not as a team. Not as an organization. And we shouldn’t as a country.
My proudest day as a Detroit Lion was the afternoon that we came together as a team and decided that we were going to cancel our practice in the wake of the Jacob Blake shooting. We had some extremely difficult conversations. We shared stories. We debated. We cried. We were vulnerable. We were uncomfortable. We were angry. We were everything.
We can’t just stick to football. Not as a team. Not as an organization. And we shouldn’t as a country.
But we went through it all as a team.
As most everyone knows, I haven’t exactly embraced social media over the years. It’s just not me. But I feel like it’s right to take the time to say what’s on my heart as we begin this new season together as a team. And what’s on my heart is that we all need to come together as a country and admit what we know is real. Deep down inside, no matter what political party we support, or what we do for a living, we know what’s real.
Police brutality, white privilege, racism — it’s all real.
It’s time we stop pretending, or defending, or just closing our eyes to what’s right in front of us. We have to listen, and we have to keep having these hard conversations.
Once again, to read the rest, please click here.
