Joe Denly has become the latest member of the England squad to call for better batting pitches in the County Championship.
Denly, the Kent batsman, was one of the few England players to emerge with any credit after a poor display in the second innings of the first Test in Mount Maunganui. After making 74 in the first innings - his fourth half-century in six Test innings - he fought hard for three-and-a-half hours in the second before he was defeated by one that reared and took his glove.
But, having reflected on his first year as a Test batsman and compared it to his long career in the first-class game - 16 years and counting - he has come to the same conclusion reached by Jos Buttler earlier in the week: if England are to compete in overseas Tests, they will have to play domestic cricket that closer replicates the conditions seen in those Tests.
"Having played quite a lot of first-class cricket, certainly the last few years it has been very tough as a top-order batter," Denly said. "Going back to when I first started my career, the benchmark for runs in a season would be 1,200-plus. Some players were scoring 1,500 or 1,600.
"You don't see that any more. I think 1,000 runs is a pretty good season. That's the kind of standard that batters across the country are setting themselves.
"That, I think, is down to the pitches we play on. It's hard work, very rarely do you come across flat surfaces where you can almost book yourself in for 100, 200 runs. You work hard for every single run. Hopefully, we can start produce batter-friendly wickets. A bit in it for both bowler and batter."
While it has to be pointed out that the county schedule has been cut in recent times - each county plays 14 rather than 16 Championship matches a season - few would deny that Denly has a point. The combination of the Dukes ball, which tends to seam and swing for longer than other brands, and surfaces providing seam bowlers assistance has created an entertaining County Championship but also one that offers little comparison to conditions found in Mount Maunganui in recent days. And with England's bowlers lacking experience in bowling in such conditions and their batsmen lacking experience in batting in them, England slipped to their fourth innings defeat in 14 away Tests under Joe Root's leadership. Only one man in Division One of the Championship - Dom Sibley - made 1,000 runs in the 2019 season.
"Making big scores becomes a habit," Denly continued. "It's all very well saying we need to go on and get these big scores [for England]. But if it is not something you're used to doing [with your county], then it's not quite as easy as that. Hopefully, we can help these young batters by producing some better wickets for them to go on and get those big scores."
Although many will agree with Denly, improving county surfaces will not be easy. With limited-overs cricket occupying a window in the prime weeks of summer, the Championship programme has, in recent years, been pushed ever more towards early and late season when groundsmen have little chance of preparing flat batting tracks. Equally, groundstaff are hampered by the amount of tracks they are required to prepare, regulations removing the use of the heavy roller and pressure from coaches who demand result wickets. In the longer term, there is talk of playing the Championship at the same time as The Hundred, which might allow for better surfaces, albeit away from Test grounds, which will be required for The Hundred, and without many of the country's best players.
Meanwhile, Denly confirmed that he was fit - and keen - to bowl in the first Test. Although he suffered an ankle injury that kept him out of the T20I series, he had recovered in time to play a full part in the first Test. He has taken 66 first-class wickets with his part-time leg-spin.
"I might have to reiterate to Rooty that I am able to bowl," he said. "I would have liked to have a bowl in this game. He did tell me to warm up just before Mitchell Santner got out. And then he got out so I didn't get that chance. I will be able to bowl in Hamilton."
PITTSBURGH - Encouraged by the boost of energy quarterback Devlin "Duck" Hodges gave the Pittsburgh Steelers against the Cincinnati Bengals, Mike Tomlin announced Tuesday Hodges would be the starter in Sunday's rematch with the Cleveland Browns.
"We met as a staff, we decided that we're going to start Duck this week." Tomlin said. "Really, the decision is clear for us ... I thought he provided us a spark in-game. I'm hopeful that he's capable of continuing to provide that spark as we step into this stadium."
Tomlin cautioned, though, that this wasn't a permanent decision for the rest of the season.
"It means nothing about our intended plans for the foreseeable future or the trajectory of Mason's career," Tomlin said. "We're just not of that mentality. We're not in a position to be of that mentality. We're putting pieces together on a week-by-week basis because of the adversity that the game presents."
But what did Tomlin see of Hodges to make him the starter this week?
"He has not killed us," Tomlin said.
Sunday will be Hodges' second career start. He earned his first earlier this season playing for a concussed Rudolph against the Los Angeles Chargers in Week 6, a game the Steelers won 24-17. Hodges completed 15 of 20 attempts for 132 yards and had one touchdown and one interception. Tomlin, though, went back to Rudolph after the bye week and scoffed then at the thought of going back to Hodges following Rudolph's slow start against the Miami Dolphins.
Rudolph never shook off those slow starts and was further hampered by injuries to his surrounding cast. Perhaps most damning, though, was his penchant for turning the ball over. Rudolph had 12 touchdowns to nine interceptions in his time as a starter including four in the loss to the Browns and one in the first half of the Bengals win. Tomlin also added that the fight between Rudolph and Myles Garrett in Cleveland was not a factor in the decision to go with Hodges.
"It goes beyond just Mason and his performance," Tomlin said of making the quarterback change. "He's been in and out of the lineup. Some running backs and offensive linemen have been in and out of the lineup. We miss some guys at receiver specifically in the last game. The combination of playing without [James] Conner and JuJu [Smith-Schuster] and so maybe some of those negative things have worn away at elements of Mason's play.
"He hadn't protected the ball very recently like he did at the early portions of his participation and I got a lot of patience for young guys, but one thing that we need to do is take care of the ball. Those are one of the reasons why we gave Devlin an opportunity in Cincy."
Going forward, the bar for Hodges is apparently low. Tomlin didn't set out a list of expectations for the quarterback against Cleveland.
"There's going to be enough pressure on Devlin performing, so I'm not going to add to it by talking expectations," Tomlin said. "I expect him to not kill us."
This is the story of how a potential reconciliation between Colin Kaepernick and the NFL disintegrated into accusations and mistrust. It's told from the viewpoints of Kaepernick and his legal team, the NFL attorneys in charge of negotiating the deal for the league, an NFLPA at a curious remove from the center of the action and a host of sources close to the situation. After an extraordinary week of cynicism and possibilities, what remained after the doomed workout on Nov. 16 was a set of dueling narratives: one held that the NFL was never truly serious about a Kaepernick return; the other held that Kaepernick was so unwilling to compromise to a reasonable, professional standard that he closed the last, best chance to resume his NFL career. It all began two weeks ago, when the NFL informed Kaepernick's team that the league would hold a workout for the quarterback.
TUESDAY, NOV. 12, 2019
Colin Kaepernick's re-entry into the NFL universe was the result of what could only be called a fantastic coincidence. According to league sources, a statement that Kaepernick's team sent on Oct. 10 reiterating his readiness to return to the NFL -- a statement that news outlets tweeted and Kaepernick retweeted -- caught the attention of commissioner Roger Goodell. The post landed on receptive ears for two reasons. The first was that important business partners such as Jay-Z and respected advisers such as legendary sociologist Harry Edwards were pressuring Goodell to find a path back for Kaepernick. The second and more important reason was that the league's football operations department alerted Goodell to a piece of news long considered unlikely: two teams were legitimately interested in Kaepernick.
The confluence of events provided an opportunity for Goodell to prove his own stated position that Kaepernick was not being blacklisted for the past two-and-a-half seasons, even though the NFL had settled out of court with Kaepernick when he sued it for collusion. In the weeks following the Oct. 10 statement, the NFL's football operations team discussed with Goodell the feasibility of reaching out to Kaepernick. Goodell ultimately approved it. "Inside and outside," an NFL source says, "the thought was, 'Let's provide him the opportunity.'"
Kaepernick's camp maintained that he had been out of work for three full seasons for reasons nothing to do with football and everything to do with his politics regarding social justice and his on-field protests. Still, the NFL's strategy in approaching Kaepernick was to concentrate narrowly on football. To sources both outside the league office and the Kaepernick team, this was the NFL's first mistake; the only way to get Kaepernick and the league to trust one another was to confront their acrimonious history with diplomacy, so both sides might more easily believe each was entering the workout with legitimate motives. "To say we're going to make this about football is one of the dumbest things you can say," a source close to the situation says. "It's not a big deal. It's the whole deal, because the reason he's not playing isn't about football. Everyone knows he can play. It's the other stuff. You have to deal with the other stuff."
Instead, the league focused on the details of the potential workout itself. The league believed that holding individual workouts for the two teams that expressed interest in Kaepernick would have resulted in a crush of media attention that might have made both teams reluctant to proceed. So it decided to engineer an unprecedented league-hosted workout for an individual player. "It was the commissioner's idea, no doubt about it," a league source says. "This was a way to deal with it without the torrent of media information, the level of distraction. Bringing him in to a single team would have them bear the brunt of all of that media attention."
On Nov. 12, Kaepernick's agent Jeff Nalley was in San Francisco, having attended the Seahawks-49ers Monday night thriller the night before. Before heading to the airport for a flight to Texas, he received a missed call alert on his phone from a number he did not recognize. When he returned the call, it was Dave Gardi, the NFL's senior vice president for football operations: the NFL would hold a workout for Colin Kaepernick. The details were brief and rigid: The workout would be conducted at the Falcons' training facility in Flowery Branch, Georgia, about an hour northeast of Atlanta. There would be no media. The date would be Saturday, Nov. 16. The invitation also came with a hard deadline: Kaepernick had two hours to accept. Nalley called Kaepernick, who then called his best friend, Panthers safety Eric Reid. Kaepernick's legal team convened for a conference call.
The Kaepernick team, led by Nalley, Mark Geragos and Ben Meiselas of the law firm Geragos & Geragos, was stunned. Reid was immediately dismissive. It had to be a publicity stunt, he thought. Meiselas was circumspect: "It came out of the blue. There was no warning or indication anything like that would happen." Kaepernick and the NFL hadn't communicated since the two sides settled their multimillion-dollar collusion lawsuit in February. For all the turnover at the quarterback position during the first months of the 2019 season, as frontline starters such as Drew Brees, Cam Newton and Matthew Stafford fell to injury, Nalley's phone was silent.
In fact, no decision-making member of NFL personnel had inquired about Kaepernick since 2017, when NFL executive and former safety Troy Vincent had arranged a springtime, in-person meeting between Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and Kaepernick. Later that summer, Ravens coach John Harbaugh and Kaepernick spoke by telephone.
Given the lack of communication with the NFL for 10 months, and with only two hours to make a decision, the Kaepernick team felt strong-armed. This did not feel like a potential reconciliation. His team also did a little reconnaissance and believed the mystery teams to be Atlanta and Detroit, information it did not find particularly credible. It also made no sense to the Kaepernick team to hold a league-wide workout for just two teams. In three offseason free-agent cycles, Atlanta had never shown interest in Kaepernick; Detroit had lost quarterback Matthew Stafford to a back injury weeks earlier and instead of inquiring about Kaepernick was starting backup Jeff Driskel.
Kaepernick's team was wary. With the two-hour deadline approaching, Nalley and Meiselas were on a call with Gardi and Ken Fiore, the league's vice president for player personnel. It was the team's third call of the day with the NFL -- extraordinary in of itself because executives at their level would normally never be involved in a player workout. Meiselas said too many issues existed to turn around a workout in three-and-a-half days: Who was going to be at the workout? Which teams were going to be there? Who would Kaepernick be throwing to? Why did the workout need to be on a Saturday, when high-level NFL personnel were either scouting college players or preparing for the next day's NFL games? Why couldn't the workout be held on the following Tuesday -- the day of the week when most free-agent workouts occur? Why did it have to be in Atlanta?
The NFL rejected the Kaepernick team's request to change the dates. The Kaepernick team thought the offer took on a "take it or leave it" characteristic. The tone of the call felt procedural. According to sources from the Kaepernick team, Gardi said he was not authorized to make alterations to the offer. He was, in effect, delivering a message.
If the Kaepernick team was uneasy, the league did not consider its communications to be untoward. Saturday was chosen because the workout required an available NFL facility --all of them would be in use on a Tuesday, a regular league-wide workday. Saturday was also better than Tuesday because coaches and GMs would not collectively leave their teams during the week to attend a workout away from their facility, especially a workout as potentially loaded as this. Atlanta was the location because the Falcons offered their complex. On the call, a Kaepernick source recalls asking, "If Saturday was such a magical day, why not push it to the following Saturday?" That, the source said on the call, would give each side time to have its questions answered. The NFL refused. "Like any other free agent, they find out when the workout is, it's on short notice, and they get on a plane and get there," an NFL source says. "We thought the speed of the workout was for Colin's benefit. There aren't that many weeks left. We did not see the value in having some drawn-out, dramatic event."
To the league, there was no reason to believe the invitation was illegitimate. If Kaepernick wanted to play, here was his chance. Despite the events of the past three years, the NFL believed it could offer Kaepernick a legitimate workout based solely on football merits. It was an attitude that reflected the power and, some Kaepernick sources say, the arrogance of a $15 billion behemoth. The NFL expected its sudden offer to be accepted at face value, even though no team had asked Kaepernick to throw a football in three years. A Kaepernick source asks, "Is all supposed to be forgotten because they finally called?"
Questions went unanswered. As questions went unanswered, trust waned. The parameters were set. Kaepernick's team made two requests: that the process be legitimate, and that it receive a personnel list of which teams and their representatives would attend. The Kaepernick team then agreed to the workout, ultimately for one reason.
"Because," Meiselas says, "he's been wanting a legitimate chance for three years."
Despite the concerns regarding the NFL's motives, the one person who was generally optimistic about the workout was Kaepernick. He had been training in anonymity in New York for nearly three years, five days a week. He felt he was in great shape. To throw in an NFL environment for the first time since December 2016 was exciting. He sent out a tweet expressing his eagerness for Saturday.
"Colin had been waiting for this moment. He's not going to leave any stone unturned," says a member of his camp. "His plan is to go for it. He's going to leave it all out there? Are you kidding?"
The two sides agreed the workout would remain confidential. One member of the Kaepernick team suggested a confidentiality agreement to insure against media leaks. "We as the NFL are not going public with this," a Kaepernick team member recalls being told on the call. "But we cannot control the 32 teams." Almost immediately after the call, NFL writers began receiving a text message from the league telling them to be on the lookout for an important email. Many writers believed the email would pertain to the league and troubled wide receiver Antonio Brown, but minutes later, the email came: Colin Kaepernick would work out for the NFL on Saturday.
The Kaepernick team was furious.
"They didn't give the 32 NFL teams a heads-up, but they gave the media one?" a Kaepernick source says. "Once they betrayed us on the confidentiality agreement, we knew what this was."
WEDNESDAY, NOV. 13
The NFLPA found out about Saturday's workout when the rest of the world did. It received no advance notice from the league as a courtesy, nor from the Kaepernick camp, a circle of mistrust. The NFLPA and Kaepernick had traded slights dating back to when Kaepernick was a star with the 49ers and opted out of the NFLPA's player-wide licensing agreement. Even three years later, no one in the Kaepernick camp had forgotten how the NFLPA failed to come to his defense when an anonymous league executive told Bleacher Report that Kaepernick was the most hated man in the NFL since Rae Carruth, the Panthers wide receiver who at the time was serving a prison sentence of 18 to 24 years for ordering the murder of his pregnant girlfriend.
Nevertheless, according to both NFLPA and Kaepernick sources, the union offered its services in advance of the workout. The Kaepernick team declined the offer. But while the players' association would have no formal role in the workout, it would at least send former player Lester Archambeau to Atlanta to represent the union and have eyes on the ground.
Kaepernick felt comfortable betting on himself to impress a room of scouts, but his camp was uneasy about a workout that was made public when its details were not finalized. "You shouldn't go over the deal before there's a deal," a source from the Kaepernick team says.
The trust issues that began to emerge on Tuesday became a floodgate by Wednesday. The NFL had not yet provided a personnel list, and the reason was that none had officially signed on. Then the NFL sent word to Meiselas that it would not be providing a rolling list of team attendees and their representatives, after all. According to another member of Kaepernick's team, the league told his camp it did not renege on its promise, because it had never agreed to the provision.
By midafternoon, no teams had publicly attached themselves to the workout. Along the backchannel of private conversations between agents and team officials, it was clear the workout was a league event. Even after the announcement of the workout, Nalley's phone remained silent -- not a single team asking if his guy was in shape or what to expect. There was confusion at personnel offices around the league about who was in charge. Without the teams enthusiastically endorsing a thaw between themselves and Kaepernick, or a single owner blessing the possibility of Kaepernick's return, it was increasingly difficult to envision what Saturday could look like. As one agent says, "Leagues don't sign players. Teams do." The credibility of the event began showing signs of crumbling, isolating Goodell and placing a spotlight on what was privately around the league being called a failure of leadership.
Regardless of Goodell's best intentions, the 32 teams had to be invested for Saturday to work, and so far, they weren't. This absence of any ceremony -- a public acknowledgement that the league, the teams and Kaepernick were willing to put the past behind them, and he would again be allowed to survive or fail primarily on his football merits -- provided perhaps the biggest red flag of the entire week for Kaepernick's camp.
There was no more seismic event in the NFL over the past three years than Kaepernick. The kneeling issue split the country. It fractured the players. Black athletes on the same side of several political issues were splintered into competing factions: those who wanted any negotiations with team owners over social justice partnerships to be contingent upon lifting the silent ban on Kaepernick; and those who felt Kaepernick had squandered his leadership opportunities. President Donald Trump involved himself in the NFL protest story and shook the league and its 70% black labor force to its core when he criticized players who kneeled during the anthem, calling them "sons of bitches" and suggesting that teams fire them. To maintain labor peace, even Cowboys owner Jerry Jones took a knee on the field before a game. Now, the NFL and Kaepernick were days away from what appeared to be a reconciliation and the teams were silent, the owners were silent, and most of all the commissioner, Roger Goodell, was silent.
Sources on the NFL football operations side say the event was to be solely focused on football. But was that realistic given the animosity that existed, the wariness of teams to view him as a viable option? Other league sources say it might have helped to employ a mediator like Harry Edwards, who had written an extensive analysis advising the league to avoid turning Kaepernick into a "martyr" rather than a "model."
"It was not about the external noise. This was to be a football-centric exercise, full stop," an NFL source says. "He wanted a workout. He said he was ready to go. We set that up."
The silence of the owners undermined the workout's legitimacy. Could the symbol of the most divisive issue in the game be showcased without ironclad buy-in from the teams? Could a workout be legitimate without at least the sign-off of the most powerful owners in the game, Dallas' Jerry Jones and New England's Robert Kraft? Wouldn't Art Rooney II and John Mara, scions of the two most legendary football families, give cover to other teams it was acceptable to sign Kaepernick? If backroom negotiations between Goodell and Jay-Z -- the rap mogul having been criticized for partnering with the NFL while Kaepernick was denied employment -- were truly fueling an honest workout, wouldn't it be beneficial for Goodell to come forward? Where was the commissioner?
Some NFL sources disagreed strongly that the workout was rudderless. Dave Gardi was a respected senior executive with the league. The lack of diplomacy was mitigated by the most important, bottom-line fact: It was happening. The league was holding a workout for Colin Kaepernick. It was spending money to do it. That, league sources say, should have superseded the lack of bouquets and hugs, mediation and détentes.
"If Roger was out there, it would be viewed as self-serving," an NFL source says. "You're sort of damned if you do, damned if you don't. The intention was to give Colin what he wanted. Was he looking for an engraved invitation to come down? We were just trying to keep the media stuff to a minimum and leave it to the football side."
Furthermore, the idea that the NFL was doing something for Kaepernick it had never done for anyone in the modern history of the league was, by definition, league sources say, a good-faith opportunity. Some NFL personnel grew aggravated by the suggestion that the league was being underhanded. They expected to be trusted. "There was nothing preventing them from setting up their own workout," an NFL source says. "He and his representatives could have done that at any time."
Still, by Wednesday afternoon, hope began building that Saturday might work out after all: The league told media outlets that at least a half-dozen teams planned to send a representative to Atlanta, with more making arrangements to attend. The Kaepernick team was unsure: Without a personnel list, teams could be sending interns. Meanwhile, lawyers began negotiating granular details of the workout. The two sides agreed to let Kaepernick fly in his own team of receivers. According to league sources, NFL attorneys rejected the Kaepernick team's request for a camera crew inside the Falcons' facility, but they would be provided with footage of the workout.
The league created a special waiver release form, combining elements of previous standard NFL waivers, which was designed to protect the league and the Falcons -- at whose facility the workout was taking place -- against injury at this specific workout. The waiver the NFL sent the Kaepernick team answered one outstanding question: Former Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin was named on the second page of the release and indemnified. He would be running the workout.
The Kaepernick team took issue with the opening paragraph and paragraph No. 7 of the special waiver because both paragraphs created a wide range of rights that Kaepernick would potentially be forfeiting beyond injury.
According to the NFL, the two sides had momentum. The Kaepernick team, NFL sources say, acknowledged receipt of the edited documents and told the NFL's lawyers that whatever changes needed to be made to the waiver were "minor."
THURSDAY, NOV. 14
Kaepernick arrived in Atlanta and through a connection from one of his Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity brothers, received permission to use the football field at the Charles R. Drew High School in the Atlanta suburb of Riverdale to prepare. Kaepernick was already familiar with the city. A month earlier, on Oct. 19, he'd held a Know Your Rights camp in downtown Atlanta for 450 youth.
The NFL announced that Hue Jackson, the former Raiders and Browns head coach, would join Joe Philbin in running the workout. Jackson, who was not on the original waiver form, would later tell ESPN's First Take he had been enthusiastic about the workout, and as coach of the Raiders he'd wanted to draft Kaepernick as a rookie in 2011. Still, the Kaepernick camp viewed him with suspicion: This was the same Hue Jackson who, as coach of Cleveland in 2017, said he had no interest in Kaepernick as a free agent and that his off-field protests were a factor. Later that summer, Jackson discouraged his team from kneeling after protester Heather Heyer was killed Aug. 12 by white supremacist James Alex Fields Jr. in Charlottesville, Virginia. Twelve players knelt anyway before the Browns' preseason game against the Giants a week later. Also concerning for the Kaepernick team was that Jackson was being represented by Roc Nation, Jay-Z's company. Jackson was a good football man, but he was not considered neutral. According to sources, Goodell, who had not spoken publicly about the workout or reached out personally or through intermediaries to the Kaepernick team, called Jackson personally to arrange for him to conduct the workout.
In what appeared to be another missed opportunity for communication and transparency, Jackson and Kaepernick never spoke directly. Jackson said he dealt primarily with Nalley, telling First Take that the attitude surrounding direct communication with Kaepernick was, "We'll get to it." They never did.
By late afternoon, the league office said 11 teams would be sending representatives to the workout, which should have, it believed at the time, calmed all fears that it was just for show. Goodell that night appeared at the Paley Center for Media's International Council Summit in New York with CBS broadcaster James Brown for a program discussing the NFL's 100th anniversary. With Kaepernick less than two days away from the workout, and most teams pledging their attendance but refusing to publicly endorse it, Goodell took no questions. "Roger and I are going to stick to the topic here," Brown said, according to Deadline.com. "It would take us all day to deal with what the breaking news is." Even with Dallas and New England announcing they would not attend, the league's most anticipated event expected the vast majority of teams. And yet the NFL, insisting the workout was legitimate, still had no one willing to take public ownership for it -- not even the commissioner, the person most responsible for setting its wheels in motion.
Colin Kaepernick declares that he has been ready to play for three years, and the ball is in the NFL and Roger Goodell's court.
FRIDAY, NOV. 15
That left the lawyers. While Kaepernick was practicing indoors at Georgia Tech because of a torrential downpour, league attorney Larry Ferazani fully expected to have a deal done. With one day before the workout, the lead negotiators for both camps were now working together. Ferazani was well-respected by the Kaepernick camp. One called him "the voice of reason" over at NFL headquarters. He and Meiselas had crisscrossed the country together litigating the Kaepernick lawsuit. Each said they viewed Friday optimistically, but both were beginning to harbor deep reservations. NFL sources say the Kaepernick team did not promptly respond to its questions regarding the waiver, losing precious time as Saturday approached. The Kaepernick team was confounded as to why the NFL would not adopt the standard injury waiver, amend its language, nor allow independent cameras.
With a better climate of trust, perhaps the two parties could have worked out the details, which would become nuclear, and ultimately fatal: At issue for the Kaepernick team was a clause in the waiver stipulating the quarterback waive his rights to any and all claims stemming from the workout. This was a major sticking point, because the million-dollar question any team would have was whether Kaepernick would kneel should he be signed to a roster. If he said he would, and eventually no team chose to sign him, the NFL would have exposed itself to a second collusion lawsuit. But by signing the waiver, Kaepernick would have forfeited his rights to pursue an action.
League sources say the NFL was viewing the waiver only for injury liability and had no sinister intention of using that or other similarly broad clauses in the waiver as a backdoor attempt to get Kaepernick to forfeit his rights. League sources say a true collusion case couldn't have been stopped by that waiver. "If that's all it took," a league source says, "we would've done something like this two years ago and saved ourselves a bunch of money." The Kaepernick team's position was direct: If injury liability was the only motive, why wouldn't the NFL agree to its own standard injury waiver form? "It would have been malpractice for an attorney to allow his client to sign that document," Meiselas says.
The details, once negotiable, were becoming impediments. By late afternoon Friday, the Kaepernick team began thinking about Plan B, not as a bargaining chip, but because Kaepernick wanted to guarantee he didn't leave Atlanta without conducting a workout for all to see.
SATURDAY, NOV. 16
Five hours before the scheduled 3 p.m. workout, the mirror Kaepernick had held up to the United States for the previous three years was reflected at the Falcons facility in Flowery Branch. Three protesters stood on the right side of the complex's entrance, American flags and signs fixed into the grass. Two Kaepernick supporters sat to the left of the entrance. By noon, the number of supporters swelled. Television cameras set up across Falcon Parkway.
By 12:30, the waiver issue appeared to be resolved. Both lawyers were in town: Meiselas took a red-eye from San Francisco, Ferazani the morning flight from JFK. The Kaepernick team said if the NFL would agree to its standard injury form, the same one signed the day before to work out at Georgia Tech, Kaepernick would sign it. The NFL demanded its own form be used, and the negotiation continued.
But no movement was being made on Kaepernick's request for independent filming. The issue for him was trust and transparency. The fear: the NFL would manipulate the footage and send to the media and the teams not in attendance an edited version highlighting his mistakes -- bad throws, stumbles, poor footwork -- as proof he was no longer NFL material.
The NFL team believed that fear to be completely unfounded, and offered Kaepernick's team the raw footage immediately following the workout. The league's lawyers said they would allow Kaepernick's team to sit with the NFL camera crew. The Fritz Pollard Alliance would be in attendance. There would be no "rigging" of footage. The Kaepernick team did not budge, believing it should have the right to film its client's workout.
"The focus was on the workout," an NFL source says. "If we wanted to turn it into a publicity stunt, it would have been on NFL Network. It would have been on ESPN. We're celebrating our 100th anniversary. Why would we bring this upon ourselves?"
Says another NFL source: "The Falcons were opening up their facility and we wanted to be respectful. ... If you look at what we were willing to do, their concerns don't hold water. They could stop the video whenever they liked, and we'd give them the raw footage. It has as much legitimacy as their concerns about the waiver."
The league questioned Kaepernick's motives. What was the big deal about footage? Was the demand for footage just part of a marketing ploy?
By 1 p.m., more than 100 Kaepernick supporters lined the left side of the complex entrance, while anti-Kaepernick passersbys honked in support of his three protesters. When the NFL rejected the request for independent filming, the Kaepernick team wanted to invite the media. Kaepernick's team did not trust the NFL to be the only official eyes on the workout. Furious that Kaepernick's team was now "fundamentally altering the agreement," the NFL refused. Around 1:15, the Kaepernick team began texting its Know Your Rights contacts on the ground to be alert to a change of plans.
By 2 p.m., a steady stream of black SUVs began approaching the gate. The teams were arriving. A caravan of media lined up to enter the workout facility grounds. Around 120 Kaepernick supporters, including several Kappa fraternity brothers, took pictures and awaited his arrival. A member of the Falcons' security staff held a clipboard with the names of attending teams and their representatives -- the personnel list the Kaepernick team requested on Tuesday and never received. Hue Jackson was in the building, preparing for the workout with four free-agent wide receivers the NFL had flown in who were hoping to impress league scouts.
Reputations were on the line. Trust collapsed and the old resentments reinforced the old walls -- Kaepernick remained convinced the NFL was never serious about having him back in the league and that the entire week was just a ploy to get him to waive his rights; the NFL believed Kaepernick was gaming it all along and that he didn't really want to play in the NFL. NFL personnel were exhausted by the event. "What did else did he want," a league source says, "to have Roger pick him up at the airport?"
With cars lined up awaiting entry into the Falcons facility, Ferazani says he received a two-word text message from Meiselas at 2:28 p.m.: "We tried."
It was over. The Kaepernick team released a statement that it would be moving its workout to another location to be announced shortly. According to NFL sources, 25 teams were on site. Unbeknownst to the arriving teams, the gates opened for a show that was already closed.
At 2:50 p.m., Jackson said he received word that the Kaepernick team had moved the venue to the Charles R. Drew High School in Riverdale, at 4 p.m. It was the same Drew High School where Kaepernick had practiced two days earlier. Reporters, fans and television trucks raced down Interstate 285 to the high school.
Inside, Ferazani called the league office to relay the news, then thanked the NFL talent evaluators, telling them they were welcome to watch the wide receivers they had flown in to work out, could go to the relocated workout or go home. Though the school was just 10 minutes from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Hue Jackson went straight to the airport and went home.
Without the leadership, mediation and true buy-in from the teams, the workout was doomed. Jerry Jones, the game's most prolific dealmaker, never endorsed the workout. He did not send personnel to Atlanta, appearing to take a bleak view of what occurred.
"That situation from the get-go probably had a lot more that wasn't about football involved in it," Jones told The Dallas Morning News, "and consequently we got the results of that dynamic."
RIVERDALE, GEORGIA
Jessie Goree was hungry. As chairwoman for the Clayton County School District and a member of the school board, she had been at a school retreat and then attended a meeting. Which one? "The only one," she says. "Delta Sigma Theta." Her plan was to head over to Supreme Fish Delight on Norman Drive when, at 3:45 p.m., the first of a furious series of texts came in asking whether the news racing through town was true: Colin Kaepernick was going to work out at Drew High School in Riverdale. Her district.
"None of us knew. We had board members who were mad because they didn't know," she says. "If it was planned, I would have known."
Rumors were flying. There was talk that Kaepernick had contacted the Buford City School District, right down the road from Flowery Branch, but was rejected. However, according to Kerri Leland, communications director of Buford Public Schools, no request was made by the Kaepernick team. Another rumor says Kaepernick contacted Atlanta Public Schools and was also denied. The district did not return an ESPN request for comment.
This much was true: Kaepernick's team was scrambling. Time was running short and they were running out of options, but Kaepernick had resolved not to leave Atlanta without a public workout. The team made a final call to return to Drew, where he had worked out on Thursday, and received permission. As more texts followed, Goree sprang into action. She called Morcease J. Beasley, Clayton County superintendent of schools, but his cell phone was off. She called the deputy superintendent, Ralph Simpson. No good.
Finally, she called Thomas Y. Trawick Jr., the Clayton County School District chief of safety and security. He would know for crowd control purposes. He did not know, either.
By 4 p.m., her granddaughter called and needed a flute for school. Before she headed to the store, Simpson called back and told her the rumors were indeed true: He had authorized Kaepernick to work out at the high school. She was on her way to Drew Stadium.
"My granddaughter was more important than Colin Kaepernick, though," she says. "I figured I'd get the flute, then stop on over after."
At Drew, several members of Kaepernick's staff wearing black No. 7 jerseys worked the grounds. A row of vans parked on the track, ringing the football field. An attendant at the gate required a signature and requested an email address for entry.
The Panthers were hosting the Falcons in Charlotte the next day, but Eric Reid was on the field, at Drew, supporting Kaepernick on his own time. Four receivers whom Kaepernick had flown in -- Bruce Ellington, Brice Butler, Jordan Veasy and Ari Werts -- warmed up. Kaepernick, wearing a T-shirt that read "Kunta Kinte" -- the character from Alex Haley's novel/biopic "Roots" -- stretched next to the track. About 200 fans lined the fence.
At 4:38 p.m., 98 minutes after he was supposed to have worked out at Flowery Branch, Kaepernick took the field to cheers. San Francisco, Kansas City, the Jets, Tennessee, Philadelphia and Washington had representatives there, as did Detroit -- one of the two teams that purportedly showed enough interest in Kaepernick to prompt Goodell to greenlight the workout. Still, some of the representatives did not want it revealed that they attended Kaepernick's Drew workout.
Kaepernick threw for roughly 58 minutes -- short balls, rollouts, deep routes. His team live streamed the event to satisfy his desire for transparency. When it ended, he signed autographs for fans and delivered a message to the NFL: "I've been ready for three years. I've been denied for three years. We all know why. I came out here and showed it today in front of everybody. We have nothing to hide. So we're waiting for the 32 owners, the 32 teams, Roger Goodell, all of them to stop running. Stop running from the truth. Stop running from the people."
Nalley addressed the bank of reporters, reinforcing his initial fear from earlier in the week that the NFL initiated an opportunity but it wasn't legitimate. "It's important to remember that no team asked for this," Nalley said. "This came from the league office."
Says another Kaepernick source: "This thing had been pretty much dead. They [the league] were the ones who gave it CPR."
AFTERMATH
Within hours of the Kaepernick team's departure from Drew, the NFL distributed to various media contacts a flurry of documents that seemed designed to promote the position that Kaepernick's gamesmanship killed the deal. The league office sent a copy of Wednesday's waiver form, which named Philbin but not Jackson, the standard rookie waiver from the NFL combine and, most disturbing to the Kaepernick team, Kaepernick's signed 2011 rookie waiver from his combine year. The purpose was to show that the documents were not only similar in nature, unworthy of being deal breakers, but contracts Kaepernick already had signed.
It was an approach, NFLPA sources say, that reflected the NFL's belief that its enormous media advantage could muscle Kaepernick into a disadvantageous public position. In actuality, the documents in several ways strengthened the Kaepernick team's weeklong grievance that the negotiation needed to be private. The workout waiver was different from a combine waiver because the latter waived rights for a finite period of time, while the former forfeited Kaepernick's rights to sue against a collusive act in perpetuity.
Moreover, the traditional combine waiver is designed to address prospective professionals not actively in the NFL, not veteran quarterbacks who have a contentious relationship and history of litigation with the league. The league, a Players Coalition source says, didn't appreciate the history of the two sides, and instead of treating the waiver negotiations as occurring between equals, took the reductive position that Kaepernick was just another player.
The waiver Kaepernick signed Feb. 24, 2011, occurred during the NFL lockout, and its conditions no longer exist. The new labor agreement was signed in July 2011, and as part of the negotiation, the waiver form Kaepernick signed eight years ago was dissolved, replaced by a shorter, simpler form. Furthermore, from the Kaepernick team's perspective, releasing information from Kaepernick's record exposed the NFL to a lawsuit for violation of the league's personnel records policy. That the NFL sent out these documents to media confirmed for the Kaepernick team what it feared all along: The NFL was more interested in winning the public relations battle.
"Good faith means acting in a manner that represents the reasons why you initiated contact with us," says a source in Kaepernick's camp. "You say you're trying to help him, but you don't allow him to film his own workout independently and you place unrealistic conditions in the waiver, and you don't even leak, you announce the workout before a deal was ever in place. Is that really trying to help him get back on the field?"
On Sunday, 24 hours after the workout, Nalley sent the workout footage to all 32 teams, and thus far, to silence.
Nalley says Kaepernick is considering another workout for teams, perhaps at the league meetings March 29 through April 1 in Palm Beach, Florida, where all 32 team owners, coaches and general managers will be present. He also suggested the 2020 NFL combine in Indianapolis, but Kaepernick rejected the idea on the grounds he did not want to upstage an important moment for prospective NFL rookies.
A stunning week of legal documents and shifting venues resulted in more retrenchment than enlightenment, previous positions perhaps even more hardened than when the week began.
"A lot of it reinforced the concerns to bring him aboard in the first place," an NFL source says. "It would be hard for us as a league to do another [workout] again. It would really be up to him to change this. He could say he's a football player and we're not going to have the other stuff. It was an incredible disappointment. I really believe this was a good-faith effort and I believe there would have been a positive result."
Without the leadership, mediation and true buy-in from the teams, the workout was doomed. Goodell has not spoken publicly about the event he greenlit. The remaining void has the Kaepernick team believing that the league had never been serious. For Kaepernick, the week was an attempt by the NFL to secure a legal maneuver. "They wanted cover for their teams," a source says. "Otherwise, the teams would have taken the lead to invite him in."
NEW YORK -- A full postseason share on World Series champion Washington was worth $382,358, down from $416,838 for Boston last year and the record $438,902 for Houston in 2017.
The commissioner's office said Tuesday that the Nationals voted 61 full shares, more than 14 partial shares and two cash awards. The Red Sox had 66 full shares, more than 10 partial shares and eight cash awards.
The players' pool was nearly $81 million, the third highest behind a record $88 million last year and more than $84 million in 2017.
A share on AL champion Houston was worth $256,030, down from the $262,027 for the Dodgers in 2018 and $259,722 for Los Angeles in 2017.
Full shares were worth $144,025 for St. Louis, $114,367 for the New York Yankees, $37,187 for Minnesota, $36,835 for Tampa Bay. $33,624 for Atlanta, $32,428 for the Dodgers, $18,919 for Oakland and $14,292 for Milwaukee.
The players' pool included 50 percent of the gate receipts from wild-card games and 60 percent each from the first three games of the Division Series and the first four games of the League Championship Series and World Series.
Former Wales forwards coach Robin McBryde has joined Warren Gatland's Barbarians coaching staff to face Wayne Pivac's Wales on Saturday.
Like Gatland, McBryde left his Wales role after their fourth-place finish at the 2019 World Cup in Japan.
McBryde's long-term future lies with Irish province Leinster.
In the meantime, he will prepare the Barbarians to take on forwards coached by his former Wales hooker rival Jonathan Humphreys, Pivac's assistant.
England and Bath back Anthony Watson will be out of action until at least Christmas after sustaining a knee injury in their defeat by Harlequins.
Watson underwent an MRI scan on Monday to assess the extent of the injury, however he does not require surgery.
Meanwhile, club captain Charlie Ewels also limped off with a knee injury and has suffered a medial ligament tear.
"Both are collision injuries which happen and there's nothing we can do," director of rugby Stuart Hooper said.
Speaking to BBC Radio Bristol, Hooper continued: "Anthony is in a brace but doesn't require surgery and we get him back ready to perform as soon as possible.
"Charlie has a similar mechanism of injury. It's a knee injury. He's going to see the surgeon tomorrow to see what the best steps are next."
Watson has had problems with an Achilles injury over the past two seasons, which he ruptured for a second time during a photo shoot with NFL players.
"It's a short term thing that Anthony is working on and we need to get right. He is absolutely one of the most diligent professionals around," Hooper added.
"Anything to do with himself or getting ready to play on the field. Alongside our performance department will be working on it 24/7 to get him back as soon as possible."
MADERA, Calif. – The Carlos Vieira Foundation and their Race 2B Drug Free Campaign have joined forces with Madera Speedway to support the Nut Up Pro Late Model Series.
An additional $75,000 will be up for grabs during the Race 2B Drug Free BIG 3 on March 14, July 25, and Oct. 3.
Both the season opener on March 14 and the Summer Speedfest on July 25 will pay $5,000 to win, with $3,000 for second and $2,000 for third. The Short Track Shootout finale on Oct. 3 pays $10,000 to win, $5,000 for second, and $2,500 for third. Each night’s B Main event will also see exciting purse increases, with $1,500 to win followed by $750 for second and $500 for third.
Drivers in the BIG 3 will be competing for a special point fund with $5,000 for the champion, $2,500 for second, and $1,000 for third.
A $10,000 bonus has been offered if any driver can sweep all three races. A $10,000 Triple Main Challenge will be offered for the fast-time qualifier. If that driver can win the C Main, B Main and feature all from the rear of the field they will win the bonus. An additional $5,000 bonus will be awarded if a driver can sweep all three fast-time awards. Additional $5,000 bonuses have also been posted for finishing in the top-three in all three races, leading the most laps in all three BIG 3 races, and a bonus for winning all three B Mains.
“I love the sport of racing and I believe that this sport is a great way to help in deterring some kids and adults from going down the wrong path in their life. Through our foundation and our Race 2B Drug Free Campaign, we are continually supporting ways to help kids stay away from drugs,” Carlos Vieira said.
The Race 2B Drug Free sponsors motivational speakers to visit schools, speaking first-hand about the consequences associated with experimenting with drugs. The foundation also helps by providing a safe place for kids to go after school. The Carlos Vieira Foundation sponsors a free, afterschool boxing and Jujitsu program where kids can positively release aggression and self-threatening behavior. They help youth replace it with learning discipline, camaraderie, and self-wellness.
“By sponsoring the BIG 3 Race Series, we are hoping to support a successful event in which kids and adults can look forward to the sport of racing, which is thrilling and exhilarating but does not involve being out in the streets and getting in trouble,” Vieira said.
“We are passionate about youth in our community and partnering with the Carlos Vieira Foundation to gain more awareness for the Race 2B Drug Free campaign is a great way to bring more people to the Madera Speedway that would otherwise not gain exposure to our sport,” Promoter Kenny Shepherd said. “I also see this as a great opportunity for us to use the platform we have with the speedway and our MAVTV show to raise awareness for the campaign. We came up with the three-race series that will create record amounts of prize money available for the drivers while at the same time promoting a great cause.”
The heart of racing season may be over, but that doesn’t mean racing has stopped! With a few events on the schedule last week, were the any major changes in the SPEED SPORT Power Rankings? Click below to find out.
Every year, shots are hit in golf that we remember forever. At least for a for a long while.
Some result in monumental victories. Others are so good that they can only be pulled off by the best players in the world. And then there are some that we retain in our memories for other reasons.
This isn’t just a bunch of holes-in-one and albatrosses!
From Tiger Woods’ winning putt at the Masters (and many more Tiger shots) to Amy Bockerstette’s inspirational sand save in Phoenix, here are the shots that shaped 2019, in no particular order:
Adam Long went head to head with Phil Mickelson down the stretch at the Desert Classic, prevailing after hitting this impressive approach shot from a very awkward lie to set up a winning birdie at the final hole and avoid a playoff.
Tiger Woods is racking up quite the hardware in this article. There’s moving the ball, and then there’s moving the ball like Bubba Watson did on Augusta National’s 10th hole to win the 2012 Masters. Though it didn’t win him a green jacket, this bunker shot by Woods in Mexico – and epic follow-through – produced one of the most iconic shots of the year (see above image). The actual shot wasn’t bad, either.
Tony Romo has gotten some flak for playing in PGA Tour events via sponsor exemptions, but there's no doubt the former NFL quarterback has serious game. He proved it during this year's AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am with this shot from the hospitality pavilion at No. 15.
The par-3 16th hole at TPC Scottsdale is one of the most intimidating holes in golf. But for Amy Bockerstette, it was no match, as the 20-year-old Special Olympian made the Par of the Year, getting up and down from the bunker during the Phoenix Open pro-am alongside Gary Woodland and Matt Kuchar. “To step up in front of all the people and the crowd and everything, and to hit the shots that she hit and make par,” Woodland said, “I never rooted so hard for somebody on a golf course.”
OK, so this isn’t exactly a highlight, but of all the poor shots hit this year, none stung more than this. Not only did Rory McIlroy yank his opening tee ball out of bounds on Royal Portrush’s first hole en route to a quadruple-bogey 8, he also shot 79 to end his Open hopes before they even started. Luckily, Shane Lowry was able to give the Irish fans something to celebrate.
As Tiger Woods put together another victorious Sunday at Augusta National, four contenders – Brooks Koepka, Ian Poulter, Francesco Molinari and Tony Finau found Rae’s Creek with their tee balls at No. 12. Molinari’s came when the Italian was leading by two shots and he walked to the 13th tee tied with Woods.
Of course, Tiger Woods’ Masters victory likely wouldn’t have been possible without this crucial approach to 4 feet at the par-3 16th hole, which set up birdie to give Woods a two-shot cushion.
Nine years after his last major victory, Tiger Woods put the finishing touches on major win No. 15 – and green jacket No. 5 – with this 1-foot putt. Who cares if it was for bogey?
When Justin Thomas holed out for eagle on the 16th hole during the third round of the BMW Championship, it shed light on a season-long wager between he and Brooks Koepka. For the holeout, Thomas earned a nice $1,000. Of course, that paled in comparison to the nearly $1.7 million that Thomas collected for winning the season FedExCup playoff event.
Gary Woodland held off Mr. Major, Brooks Koepka, to win the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. No shot was more memorable than this chip from the fringe at No. 17.
After hitting his second shot to the fringe at the par-5 18th hole at TPC Twin Cities, 21-year-old Matthew Wolff appeared likely to go into a playoff at the 3M Open with Bryson DeChambeau and Collin Morikawa. Instead, Wolff, less than two months removed from winning the NCAA individual title, drained the eagle putt to win his first PGA Tour title and automatically earn his place in the big leagues.
In the greatest Solheim Cup finish in history, Europe's Suzann Pettersen, who had been a controversial captain's pick, put an exclamation point on her Solheim Cup legend by sinking the winning birdie putt on the final hole at Gleneagles. Even better: Pettersen announced her retirement shortly after. What an ending!
For much of the year, hitting bombs didn’t exactly pay off for Phil Mickelson, who finished the season ranked T-165 in strokes gained off the tee. But during the second round of the CJ Cup, Mickelson almost bombed a drive right in the hole at the 353-yard, par-4 14th hole at Nine Bridges. The flagstick, though, had the last laugh.
During a match against Brandt Snedeker at the WGC-Dell Match Play, Tiger Woods found himself in a position us weekend warriors are quite familiar with. Only difference: Woods actually pulled the shot off, turning the club over and punching his ball out of the bushes left-handed, from his knees, to a few feet.
This 70-foot bomb by Jhonattan Vegas from the final round of the Players Championship set the record for longest putt ever made at TPC Sawgrass’ famed 17th hole.
It had some pace – boy, did it have some pace! – but in the end, it dropped, and Hinako Shibuno’s 25-foot birdie make earned the 20-year-old, nicknamed “Smiling Cinderella,” the Women’s British Open title in her first start outside of Japan.
It’s not uncommon for tee balls to miss the green at TPC Sawgrass’ island 17th hole. But Ryan Moore’s tee shot in the first round of The Players was a rarity – it flew directly into the hole.
As is the case with most years, 2019 produced its fair share of hole-outs. This one by Jason Day at the Memorial was arguably the most impressive from 100-plus yards out.
Who doesn’t love a good double eagle? Harris English’s hole-out from 236 yards on TPC Sawgrass’ 11th hole is this year’s best, well, according to this article.
Jeff Maggert holed out for eagle on the third playoff hole to win the Charles Schwab Cup Championship. No one was happier, though, than Scott McCarron, who gave Maggert a huge bear hug after Maggert's walk-off secured McCarron the $1 million Schwab Cup bonus.
Jon Rahm brought home both the DP World Tour Championship and Race to Dubai titles with a one-shot victory over Tommy Fleetwood in Dubai, a win that was clinched with this 72nd-hole sand save.
With the largest first-place prize in women's golf history on the line, Sei Young Kim holed this 25-foot birdie putt to win the CME Group Tour Championship.
It’s not often 3-foot putts make a list of top shots, but when they make you laugh as much as these “walk-ins” by Kevin Na and Tiger Woods, they deserve a place.
Of all the players who secured their PGA Tour cards via the Korn Ferry Tour Finals, few did so as emphatically as Doug Ghim. The Texas alum needed to make par on his 72nd hole of the KFT Championship, and he did, delivering a huge fist pump in celebration.
The shots of Brooks Koepka, nude, in ESPN the Magazine’s Body Issue.
Hello, Sam Snead! Tiger Woods tied the PGA Tour record for career wins with his 82nd title at the Zozo Championship. And unlike that closing bogey at Augusta, he sealed the deal with birdie.
Manchester United have included 19-year-old defender Max Taylor in their Europa League squad just 12 months after having chemotheraphy for testicular cancer.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's side travel to the Kazakhstan capital to face Astana on Thursday with qualification to the round of 32 already assured. And Taylor is one of a number of youngsters to make the trip.
- Europa League group stage: All you need to know
Taylor only returned to training with United in September following his treatment.
"I feel immensely proud and happy to be back on the training pitch with my teammates and friends," Taylor to United's website at the time. "Without the invaluable support of my family, teammates and, of course, the nurses and doctors, my return to training at this stage would not have been possible.
"I want to thank all of the club's medical and sports-science staff that I have worked with throughout my rehabilitation.
"The next step is to continue working hard in the gym, and out on the grass, to hopefully make my return on the pitch."
United beat Astana 1-0 in the reverse fixture at Old Trafford with Mason Greenwood scoring the only goal.
ESPN FC correspondent Rob Dawson contributed to this report
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