2020: The Year Professional Athletes Fully Embraced Their Freedom Of Speech

Few athletes have ever had a bigger voice than Michael Jordan. His, no doubt, still haunts opponents yet commands respect. MJ’s voice is so valuable that in the 38 years since he hit the game-winning shot against Georgetown to capture the 1982 NCAA Title for the North Carolina Tar Heels, he’s been sought after to influence your purchases of everything from shoes and underwear to restaurants and car dealerships. 

But there were always two places Jordan didn’t make his voice known: politics and disagreements with his coaches. In those spots, he always assumed the silence many believed athletes should maintain.

This summer, all of that has changed. When history records all that happened in 2020, it will certainly note that this was the year athletes gained a full-throated use of their voices. Many in society don’t like it – remember the “shut up and dribble” rhetoric of one television personality.

In the business world, executives who are stretching the truth publically should expect to be held accountable by a leading employee or a board of directors. That’s why I was riveted by the story of an All-American football player and team captain at Florida State University named Marvin Wilson who pulled back the curtain on his head coach’s lip service. It happened in June, roughly a week or so after the well-documented death of a handcuffed George Floyd, by Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin, who video footage showed knelt on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. As the country ignited into polarizing debates of social justice, police brutality, protests, riots, and racism, FSU head coach Mike Norvell answered a reporter’s question about how his players had been coping with the emotions of the moment—venturing so far as to say that he’d gone “back and forth individually with every player” on the team to make sure they were processing things well. Typically, a college football coach’s word is untested by student-athletes, but roughly one hour after the coach’s quote surfaced in the media, Wilson took to social media voicing a different tone. That rarely happens in collegiate sports so Wilson’s tweet sent shockwaves through the program and sent the university scrambling to figure out how to limit the damage as Wilson and his teammates threatened to stop practice altogether. That exchange resulted in an explanation and apology from the head coach and, in my opinion, the first boost in volume this year to the voice of athletes.  In this instance, the best player on the team made his voice heard, and was strong enough to begin a new conversation about how to move forward together, better.

Many athletes are given a platform as long as they hit more homeruns or catch more passes for our favorite team, but I’d argue it’s a flawed platform that frequently demands that a player’s voice be void of real opinions about life’s most real circumstances.  Topics of race, equality, and politics are often accompanied by a “Just stick to sports” backlash. (Fascinating to me that when employees in other professions express their opinions on situations – Google employees walking off the job to highlight issues they find distasteful didn’t lead anyone to stop using Google – it is “accepted,” but not when athletes do so.)

A prime example is the NBA playoff restart down at the Walt Disney World “Bubble” as players went on strike for 2 days and contemplated leaving the postseason unresolved in protest to a recent lightning rod incident involving racial tension and a police shooting that circulated the news cycle. It took place in the home state of the Milwaukee Bucks so the top seed in the Eastern Conference took action, refusing to play. It’s one thing to make your voice loud; it’s another to exercise the strength in that voice. The Bucks did just that—choosing to spend the nearly three hours of game time, on the phone calling elected officials and the Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin to raise awareness, ask for help, and demand change.  Even several of the league’s household names like LeBron James and Chris Paul have used their platforms to put pressure on team owners. One of the deciding factors for the players agreeing to resume the playoffs was that each home arena be turned into large voting booths that allow for proper social distancing and easier access. It’s that progression from voice to action that makes this year’s athlete stand out to me.

Not everyone has to like a player’s point of view – frankly some of what’s been said by a few athletes I don’t agree with – but it is only because we live in the greatest nation in the world, that players have the right to express those opinions. We must also be willing to embrace athletes who choose to talk-the-talk and then walk the walk—even if it’s walking away from something meaningful like a game and the check that comes with it.

Look, I’m sure we’ll remember this year for a lot of reasons, but for me, the ascendance of players realizing the value of their voice is a big one. Let’s face it, people rushed to buy Wheaties cereal for the athlete on the box, not because its flavor danced circles around the Cheerios and Cap’n Crunch varieties on the same shelf. That’s why whenever someone argues that people don’t want to hear what athletes have to say, I simply think of Michael Jordan and the $1.7 billion in endorsement deals he has earned over nearly four decades that proves people hear athletes loud and clear.

Let’s hope that all the talk here leads somewhere good. 2020 could use it.