Kelvin Beachum: A Real One Doing Real Work

For years Kelvin has used his platform and resources to end the digital divide. He joined Steve and Jim to talk about why that issue is important to him (11:48) and why he believes having broadband internet is a basic human right (14:36). As a Players Coalition task force member, Kelvin has also been at the forefront of the group’s work on criminal justice reform and he talks about the complexities of tackling that issue (23:26). And as a Black NFL player, Kelvin explains why it’s imperative that the league has more Black head coaches, general managers, and team executives (39:35). Plus, Steve and Jim say Cam Newton deserves credit for showing grace while being heckled by a young man at his football camp.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Coming up on Huddling Flow, we're not only talking to
the top, but we're walking the walk. And I can
say that that's for me what's most important, and that's
changing narratives because you know, at one point in time,
we will sell outs. You know, uh, we we were escapegoats.
We we took NFL money and we ran and you
know we're gonna you know, we we got hush money.

(00:22):
I don't, I don't. I can't say that any person
that was involved what was that two thousand and eighteen,
two thousand seventeen can say that this was hush money. Um.
And again, it's not that we're just crediting anybody else
that's done anything within this landscape. We're all about being collaborative.
But what we set out to do, we've done. We've
executed on exactly what we said out to do. That's

(00:45):
next on Huddling Flow. Welcome everybody to another edition of

(01:05):
the Huddle and Flow podcast, brought to you by Into It,
proud makers of Turbo Tax, Meant and Quick Books. I
am Steve White and my guy Jim Trotter, two thirds
of the Howard University Mob. Thomas Warren back on the
ones and two's completing the puzzle Hu Mob and Jim.
Real interesting week now, we're kind of a few weeks

(01:26):
to move from the super Bowl. We're edging towards free agency.
We're hearing stuff about, uh the salary cap coming down
and this and that. But to me, the bigger story, uh,
coming into this week and coming off of this weekend,
it was more of a human one involving Cam Newton.
People have seen the viral video of a young man

(01:46):
football player participating in a seven on seven tournament that
Cam helps sponsor. He's got teams in the seven on
seven group, and the younger man was barking at Camp,
you're a free agent, You're about to be poor. You
ain't this and that, this and that, and then Cam
coming back and engaging the kid. And first of all,
people thought he was trolling the kid, like who are you?
What have you done? This? And that? Where's your dad?

(02:08):
But Cam was saying, Hey, where's your dad? I want
to have a man to man conversation with him, and
this and that. But this was this was a moment
I think where I was kind of like, ho ho
ho ho, young fella, It's not just a Cam's an
NFL player and a former m v P and he's
given his time. You don't speak to anybody, let alone
an adult the way you spoke to him. No, And

(02:33):
that's what I took away from it first and foremost.
The first thing is when I heard the teenager speaking
like that, I was like, man, Um, where are the
adults in this? Where's the coach in this? Where's the
father in this? You know, you just don't do that. Um,
that's the way we were raised. You don't speak to
adults like that. I mean, when you address um, your elders,

(02:54):
it's always missed this or miss that or misses that.
You know, there's a there's a respect factor. So that
was first and foremost. I thought that that the kid
was wrong, UM, but I thought camp for those who
don't know him and haven't seen him in environments like this,
I truly believe that that is how he viewed it
as a teachable moment and he was not going to

(03:15):
get into a barking match with this kid. And I
was happy to see that, you know, truthfully, because he
didn't throw this kid away, because he very easily could
have said get out. You know, it's my tournament and
it's a seven on the seven tournament that he puts
UM together. I was actually at one some years ago.

(03:36):
It was actually after his rookie season. I went down
to Atlanta and attended one of his seven on seven camps.
And he takes his role seriously as being sort of
a role model for these guys and being a mentor
now even as he's gotten older. So I very much
believe that that he was all about this teachable moment.

(03:57):
And what did we see this morning or Monday morning?
We saw the kid put out an apology as statement, apologizing.
Now I don't know who spoke to him about it,
but whoever did, props to them because it should have
been done right away. But to Cam, I say, I
don't know that he could have handled that much better

(04:18):
in terms of how he did, And so I just
want to give him major props for that, because I
could have gotten ugly really quickly, you know. And when
I say disrespect him, I mean also coming into his house,
because that's essentially what it was. It's Cam's house. You
were coming into Cam's house, and you were going to
disrespect him like that. That's a hard one. So I

(04:39):
give Cam a lot of credit for being um the
man that we would all hope to be in that
situation and and create a teachable moment. And I think
hopefully he got through to this kid. Well, you know,
look at speak a teachable moment to just a few minutes,
we're gonna bring on Kelvin Beecham, a veteran offensive lineman
who last seas to play with the Arizona Cardinals. We're

(04:59):
gonna get into out of his teachable moments. He's he's
working with the Player's Coalition to really bridge the digital
divide issues and and and Kelvin has been front and
center for years on a lot of these education based matters.
But I think, but you know, to get back to Cam,
I think you also realized he had dozens of young
men right there, right, and if he had flipped out

(05:20):
on this kid like a lot of people, you know,
the first thing he was he on Twitter's camp should
whipped this kid's ass, you know this, and that, No,
that's not what you do, because he's got a lot
of young, impressionable people right there. And again, let's take
the celebrity aspect out of it. He's a grown man, right,
so he said, and he's and he was and these
are mainly black kids, and he was saying, look, I'm

(05:40):
gonna engage his kid, and I'm gonna talk to him
about him. If you watched along part of the video, Hey,
when did you play today? How did you guys do? Um?
What did you do in those games? How much do
you lift? You know? And some people are kind of like, hey,
maybe Cam's mocking him because he's a pro athlete, and
you know that this kid, maybe he didn't succeed. No,
he was engaging the show man to find out about him,

(06:01):
to find out maybe why this kid popped off on
him the way he did. And the young man's name
is Jay seth Owens, at least that's on his Twitter handle,
and some reports are saying that's his name, jaysth Owens.
He's from Pennsylvania. And in his apology he said, look,
my parents did not raised me to speak to people
like that, So hopefully his parents would have done what
you and I would have done if our children ever
came out of pocket like that to an ADULTI don't

(06:24):
you ever do that again, because you're carrying our name
and our legacy and you just don't treat adults like that,
and and and you know, that's how we would have
been handled after my mother would have said, go pick
your own switch, because you're getting some of this as well.
But sir, you know again, I think this is it was.
It was just as you said, Jim Kim might not

(06:45):
be able to handle this any better. And I'm glad
that this one viral on social media because a lot
of people were saying, Hey, this is what you get.
This kid is from the troll social media world. But
I took out of it. Again, maybe it's because I'm
a middle aged man. Hey, Cam showed us with what
grace and maturity should look like under circumstances like this,

(07:08):
which where he really could have gone a lot of
different ways. I couldn't agree with you more. Um, I
think Cam gets a bad rap in a lot in
a lot of ways. People focus on how he dresses
and all of those other silly things, and at the
end of the day, it's not about any of that.
It's about who you are. It's about your character. And

(07:28):
the one thing I know about Cam when you talk
to people who have played with him, particularly later in
his career, you know when he came in he had
some learning to do in terms of how to handle
certain situations, the impact of being a leader and having
the focus on you all the time. But he works hard,
cares about his teammates, and in that situation he cared
about that young man so well. It sounds like jaseeth Owens.

(07:52):
Hopefully he learned his lesson um and and can teach
other people about it, like, hey, I did this. It's
not a cool thing to do. And let's move on
to our special guests, Kelvin Beacham, Um, who again has
been for for years, has really stepped up in the education.
You know him from your work that you've done on
the Player's Coalitions, work with a Kwam Holden and so
many of the great leaders Um you know, and some

(08:15):
of the work that he's doing. You're really focusing on
the digital divide, which has come to light more than
ever because of COVID and people having to learn and
work UM and everything remotely. So, Jim, let's go ahead
and bring in our special guests guest Kelvin Um, where
he can discuss some of the work at him and
the Player's Coalition are doing. All right, Jim, Now we're

(08:43):
joined by our special guest, Kelvin Beacham. He's a free
agent right now that he's with the Arizona Cardinals. Last season,
He's been in the NFL for a while. Kelvin, thanks
so much for joining us. Thanks so much for having
me Fellas, this is honor. That's fine on our big fella. Yeah,
we really appreciate you know, besides being h you know,
heck of a football player, the stuff, the stuff you're
doing in the community and with the players coalition and

(09:06):
on your own with your foundations. Who are the main reasons, um,
that we want you know, we wanted to have you
on the show to talk about all the work being done.
But before we get there, let's get this some real
life stuff here, Kelvin. Um, your family is from Texas
and we saw the winter storms and all of the
people who are really struggling because the power outages in
the water situation. Is everybody down there good that you

(09:31):
know your family members and everything you know they're doing better? Um,
I would say Wednesday Thursday was was pretty rough. Uh.
You know, people in the country where I'm from, my
head Texas about people they know how to survive. But
if you takes what they need for survival away for
almost a week, you know, things start to get a
little dicey. You know, had a couple of family members,

(09:53):
extended family that moved in with my my parents. You know,
they're out in the country. They got a septic tank. Uh,
they got a chimney, so they able to kind of
use us a little different means, you know, kind of
off the grid a little bit to be able to
use different means. But they found a way to make
it through. You know, right now, we're just struggling with
my grandmother trying to get her her water back on.
The water main broke outside of her house, so she

(10:14):
can't even get water into the house. Uh So trying
to get that taken care of. And you know, for
for old folks, man, it's the simple things in life
that they care most about. So she's like, baby, I
can't flush the toilet and that's all I need to
be able to do, so, you know, simple things like that.
But you know, I think, you know, if if if
nothing else, I think this is really taught people what
it's like to experience real poverty, especially for those in Texas.

(10:37):
And if you've never experienced, if you've never been a
part of it, this is just a taste of what
it's like to not have access to drinking water, have
access to to running water, having access to power. Um,
And you think about what the what players coalition is done,
and what a number of guys have done. They've tried
to to to give a voice to those who don't
have and those who don't have access. So this is
just a real time, real life. I mean, everything is

(11:00):
real life, but I mean just everybody is seeing exactly
what's going on, and you see just the disparities and
just how communities can be marginalized. That's the thing that
got me most is where you see certain communities where,
for instance, the power is on and other communities where
the power is not on, and you say, what's the difference,

(11:22):
And it's so transparent. And then from the water standpoint
is I watched what was happening in Texas, all I
kept thinking about was Flint, you know, and the thone's
up in Flint, Yes, exactly, you know. And to this point,
no one has been prosecuted for that, which which blows
my mind. UM. But yeah, no, So you know, our
prayers are out for all for everyone who's been affected,

(11:44):
and hopefully you know, we get the same UM address soon. Yeah,
we hopefully and all that. You know, you're talking about
how mother Nature highlighted some of the disparities, right, Well,
this is something you've really been you know, embroiled in.
I mean, COVID really brought a lot of a lot
of that to reality for a lot of people, a

(12:04):
lot of things, but one that you've you've been a
part of the player's coalition. Again, you independently and other
people the Digital divide Um. Explain why that was so
important to you and so many other people to address,
because that's something a lot of folks never even thought
about before. People had to learn work and be educated remotely. Yeah,

(12:26):
you know, I think when you when you put it
in the most simplest forms, you know, Jim just said
it best is those who have access and those who don't.
And when COVID, you know, the height of COVID. We're
still in COVID right now. When you think about what
was going on when you were trying to get people
to have remote learning and remote work to be something
that was a daily, um, you know, a daily portion

(12:47):
of life. That's not the case with some people in America.
And you have those who have access to the the internet,
access to WiFi, access to hotspots, you have those who don't.
It's it's it's as simple as that. I think. You know,
we've known about some of these issues. We've known about
you know. Have you in the hood, you may not
have great access to the internet. You're in a you know,

(13:07):
a housing development. You know, for me, if you're in
the country, you know, you just may not have a
signal if you walk outside your house, as simple as that.
So to realize that now education is put forth at
the forefront, because you're putting kids out of school, how
do you measure that these same young people have access
to be able to learn just like everybody else in
the country. Um And, you know, have been privy to

(13:30):
have conversations with people across the country Texas, people in Indianapolis,
people in the Atlanta, people in Chicago and l a
and you know, Seattle and in New York, you know,
all over the country, and they talk about just some
of these the very simple issues. If you on one
side of the tracks, you got access to the internet.
You're in one little silo of the community. You have
access to the internet, and if you're not, you you

(13:51):
have to create you know. Um and and it's It's
been a lot of patchwork, and I would say even
us we've we've just continued to work on symptoms. But
right now we're trying to get to the to the
root cause and some of the root issues. And we
know that that sense of village it takes, you know,
us as athletes been able to end our voice and
end our time and energy to some of these things.
What also takes the private sector plann a role. It
takes the government plan a role, both on the federal, state,

(14:14):
and local level. I mean, it takes all of us.
And I hate to use that term because the NFL
used that quite a bit this year, but you know,
at the end of the day, it really takes a
number of people wanting to be collaborative to to work
towards this come and go to just making sure that
there's equality within America. There's equality within education, and there's
equality within making sure that people have access to the internet.

(14:37):
You know, Kelvin, from my standpoint, one of the things
that concerns me most about the digital divide is I
fear that we may be losing a generation because of
the lack of equity here. And I think back to
it in our day paper and pencil was so important.
Broadband now is to me is paper and pencil for

(14:58):
this generation and for these students not to have that.
How concerned are you that potentially we could be losing
a generation with this situation? Very concerned? You know, I
consider this a public utility. You know, it's it's a
bistic I hate to put it in this term, but
I feel it's a basic human right to be able
to have access to great broadband internet. And I would

(15:21):
say we're losing three years and my and my estimation
of students due to COVID and how the digital divide
has been exacerbated. You think about I think, one, we
try to execute getting this vaccine out to everybody, and
then you two, are we really going to have things

(15:42):
back to normal? So we have these young people being
able to do not only the basic things of making
sure they can go to school learn, but can they
go home and be able to learn and can they
take part of extracurricular activities that are some of those
things that produce the well roundedness that we need for
our students to go and succeed within the global economy.
So I agree with whole heartedly. I think we're we
are going to be losing some within this generation. Especially

(16:05):
this is this three year gap that we're having right now,
just because of how extensive, um, and how why arranging
this particular issue is. So you said, you're talking about
the symptoms. Okay, so we're talking about maybe the lack
of access to WiFi. But what let's get to the
human element of this as well, because you know, in

(16:27):
some cases we have parents who are out at work.
Now you have children who are trying to be taught
by maybe grandparents or an aunt or an older sibling,
maybe they don't speak the language that well. Um. And
now you have teachers trying to communicate to a group
instead of individually. I mean, so even if they've got

(16:48):
some of this access, you know, you can talk about
addressing some of the symptoms. Is this something that that
is being addressed? I mean, and how can there be
a solution because it really seems again the human element
and of this it's just so multi tiered and complex. Yeah,
you know, it's it's very multi tier It's very complex

(17:08):
because there's an element that I don't think people talk
about enough is the digital literacy that's actually needed to
be able to operate with how fast technology is changing
and how fast or anything is changing. You know, I
think about how I used to go to school. And
I'm not old by any means, but I think about
how I used to go to school and how my

(17:29):
daughter is currently having to go to school in kindergarten
when when they were having to do things online and
virtually it's completely different. You have, you know, kindergarteners having
to use five and six different platforms to be able
to submit work and do work, and you know, having
to watch videos on YouTube and loom and all these
different pieces of technology. It's it's a digital literacy component

(17:54):
or the human element of how can you make sure
this young person can can learn? Can you provide an
opportun for this grandparents to learn because you know that
their parents are at work, or if their parents are
at home, how are they able to multitask of making
sure that they can provide for their kids as far
as making sure that they're doing what they need to
be able to work or can they work from home?

(18:14):
Do they have the means to work from home? And
can they be able to also help their kids if
their kids are having to work from home as well?
And then that stress stresses the infrastructure or the broad
band within that home, because can there be five or
six computers, you know, a laptops or smartphones, what have
you being able to work off from that one hot spot.
So it's it's a number of different layers and a

(18:35):
number of different ways in which you know, this is complex,
and you know, to say that I know the actual solution,
I can't say that I know that ship. But what
I am doing and what I can say the PLAYS
Coalition is trying to do, and some of the partners
that I've worked with, you know, I think about into
it that I've tried that I've worked with their working
through solutions that are one measurable because I think we

(18:56):
do have to find a way to measure this and
then finding ways to hit everybody within the ecosystem, the teachers,
the students, the parents, and and and being able to
bring you know, all these these silos together and try
to move you know, the ball forward as best we can.
You know, let's put a little meat on the ball
so people actually understand some of the numbers here. So

(19:17):
in doing some research on this, you know, the Pew
Research Center did a poll roughly a year ago in
early April, and what it found is that roughly one
in five parents with homebound school aged children say it's
very likely or somewhat likely their children will not be
able to complete their schoolwork because they don't have access

(19:38):
to a computer. So we're talking roughly almost a quarter
of those who were polled. And then if you go
on and you look at at further details in that
study said nearly half of all parents with lower incomes
say it is very likely or somewhat likely their children
will have to do schoolwork on a cell phone. So
we're talking almost half of those folks. For me, just

(20:01):
trying to do some research on it, cell phone at
times as a struggle. So imagine now these kids who
are trying to get the foundation of an education to
go on and be productive in society and whatnot. I wonder, Calvin,
from your standpoint, what are you hearing in terms of
the work that you're doing, um, that can best address

(20:22):
this solution. You know, I said the word earlier, but
it's it's the concept of making this a public utility
like this has to be a part of the fabric
of American now that you have high speed internet. UM,
I think about one of the solutions that we've been
working without in West Texas, where you know they're talking

(20:43):
about shooting Internet down from from space right now, you know,
and utilizing what what Tesla is doing. And here's the thing, man,
we just put a contraption a robot Omars a couple
of days ago. So it ain't like we stupid, right,
ain't we can't figure here it out. There are ways
and there are means to put uh a robot on

(21:06):
a piece of technology on Mars and have it circulated
on Mars for for weeks at a time. We can
figure out how to make sure that we can solve
this problem. Um. You know again, I'm you know, we're
talking about this on backstage. I was. I was watching um,
you know, the the MLK FBI documentary on Amazon prim

(21:27):
and you know, one of Dr King's speeches that he
got a lot of slack for was he talked about
Vietnam and how you know, the nation's priorities were mixed up.
You know, we're working about fighting communism and uh in
in Vietnam, we've got poverty right right here, you know,
a ward poverty right here. You know that we see
every single day. And I would say the same thing

(21:48):
right now. We're worried about winning a space war with
whoever we're talking about. We're starting a space agency, but
we can't find a way to make sure that people
have access to the Internet. So it's I feel it
is priorities and if we put the focus this priority
and it's not just a black thing. And I think
that's that's one thing that I want to make sure
that I reiterate it is it's not a black thing
or it's only black people that don't have access to internet. Man,

(22:10):
you go into the hills West Virginia, they got the
same thing going on. You go into to West Texas
and ain't a lot of black folks in West Texas,
but you know, you're finding ways to to to hit
people who don't have access to some of these means.
So it's not a white or black thing. It's it's
it's a people thing. And when you turn it into
a people thing, I feel you can get the right
people behind it and the right UH funds behind it.

(22:32):
But it's it's crazy to think that, you know, we
can put something on Mars, but we can't find a
way to make sure that people in the hood got Internet. Yeah,
I think that's so important what you said, because to me,
the work that the Players Coalition does at its very
core has always been about people, not necessarily about race
and whatnot. But these are human issues, not just black
white issue and whatnot. So that's why I appreciate the

(22:54):
work that you do, that the Players Coalition does, and
that others are doing, you know, to try and correct
this because poverty doesn't know color. You know, poverty costs
is Alllines. So I'm with you a hundred percent on that.
I just I'm just you know, look, my kids are grown,
but I really feel concerned about what's coming behind us

(23:16):
in terms of this generation and how we're putting people
young kids behind again. It's like starting a hundred yard
race and someone else has a fifty yard head start.
You know, it's just not right. But to kind of
change gears will be Kelvin One thing, we had an
quin bolden on Um in the early stage of this
podcast a couple of months ago, and he said, you know,

(23:36):
you see a lot of athletes and people doing the
digital divide the education thing because it's important, it's needed,
you know, But the difficult part of some of the
things that you with the Player's Coalition are trying to do.
Is also the judicial and police reform, And that's you know,
because you're facing you know, the police unions, and you're
facing laws, and you're facing systems that are inherent that

(24:01):
are much older than much older than broadband and internet. Um,
we could change gears to that. And what you're doing,
I mean, how difficult is it to try to make
headway in that realm as well on top of all
of the other things that the Player's Coalition is doing. Man,
that's that's such a soloded question. First and foremost, that's

(24:25):
what we do here. We do here, Alight, It's nothing
wrong with that, nothing wrong with that. But man, when
you think about the systematic elements, the behavior, the psychology
of some of those issues, you're forcing people to grapple
with one history, which you know a lot of people

(24:45):
don't want to grapple with history. And I try to
try to bring things in from a very historical context
and historical lens to say, hey, this is how it
used to be. Do we want to go and talk
about Bull O'Connor down in the South during the gym Crower, Like,
let's let's let's talk about it, we're gonna talk about it. So,
you know, let's talk about the historical events that are factual.

(25:08):
This is how people treated black people when they police them,
Let's talk about that. Let's talk about how the relationship
between um, you know, police and communities have been when
you think about stopping frisk in New York. Let's let's
talk about some of the issues that were real and relevant.
And if you're not willing to grapple with some of

(25:29):
those hardcore issues, it's hard to actually get somebody to
come to the table and say, hey, there are some
issues here. Um I think about currently what's going on
you know here in Phoenix that's on it. We've had
issues and I hate watching the news man, but we've
had issues here where like the police department is actually
getting caught in a lot and then it's being reported

(25:50):
by the news and then now they're backtracking, and it's like,
how do you expect people to trust the government, trust
the police, trust the unions, trust the d A when
literally you have to have an unbiased opinion to come
in and and and show that you were wrong about
how you prosecuted a man. And again that's it wasn't
a black man was it was it was a colored

(26:11):
gentleman that was said to have pushed the police during
a silent, non violent protests. So, you know, it's these
it's these issues that continue to come up. It's these
elements of distrust that continue to come up. And this
guy's across the league that have continued to work on
those issues. And you know, it's rough. It's hard, especially

(26:33):
when a black athlete talking about some of the issues
that are that are going on in our society. Um,
it's something that form one we can never get tired of.
It's one that we can never forget because at the
end of the day, we're still black riding around in
the city right now. You know, Um, it could easily
be one of us that have couldn't that that it
could have got shot. Um, it's it's it's it's that easy.
And when you have that particular mindset, as you go

(26:53):
through some of the issues and some of the circumstances
and some of the policy changes that we're trying to
to work towards, you realize that the fight is far
from over, uh, and we're just now beginning. But I
must say that you have to be willing and these unions,
the d as, the prosecutors, what have you, uh MBI, CIA,
any agency that that's dealing with the government, you have

(27:15):
to be willing to grab it. With these issues. And
again I go back to historical context again, watching Just Then,
NBI series, watching Judas this weekend, you realize that this
is not something that just started. It's it's going on
for some time. So you know when you have to
When you think about those issues and you think about
how some of these stories have been brought to light, man,

(27:37):
you just have a different perspective and when it makes you.
For me, it makes me want to fight harder. And
I can talk about the guys across the board, you know,
with players coalition, all it does is wants to make us,
you know, wants to inspire us to do even more
and continue to to to move on until you can
recognize the history of it, at the root of it.
I don't know that we can ever get to a
place where it gets better, you know. I think about

(27:58):
the video today this morning I wake up and seeing
plain old Texas of the eighteen year old black who's
walking home from Walmart and you know, a T shirt
and you know, the temperatures down there where it's it's
it's it's sub freezing and he's simply walking home and
the police come in and and and and start questioning him,
and he tells them, I'm just walking home and that's

(28:22):
not good enough, you know. And so now the female
officer touches him, and he says, ma'am, I don't want
to put my hand on a female. Please don't touch me.
And what do they do. They put their hands on him,
and now you got an issue. So when I heard
him say that to her, to me, that's at number one.
This is a young man who's been raised right. He's respectful.

(28:43):
He is saying to her, please don't put your hands
on me. I don't want to touch a female. But
then they exacerbate the situation, and so people say, why
wouldn't he just stop and talk to the police. He
is telling the police, my home is here, I'm just
walking home, and I'm in the middle of the street
because the sidewalks are ice over. So anyone who knows

(29:05):
who has walked in snow snowy conditions knows that it's
easier to walk in the middle of the street when
the tire where the tire tracks are than it is
to try and walk on the snow and the ice.
So those situations again, to me, that goes back to
the whole trust issue that you were talking about and
the historical element of it. Black folk know the history

(29:26):
and therefore there is a suspicion or a distrust with police,
and to me, police then have to understand that. And
Kelvin you with the player's coalition, I'm sure no this
There is not uniform police tracing training across the country.
It is different in every state, every state, and and
some local governments from Texas, man, you know, I know

(29:48):
it's different down there. Yeah, So if you can't add
uniform training, it's like, how do again, how do we
get to the core of this of correcting it? You know?
Something as simple is that, Um I felt for that
young man. Now here's an eighteen year old kid who's
walking home from work, who has to spend the night
in jail. And even my wife said to me, did

(30:11):
his parents even know where he was? Right? I don't.
I don't have that answer. But it's just infuriating, you know,
some of these things that are going on. So again,
I keep coming back to this. That's why I applaued
you and members of the Player Coalition and others who
are out there fighting that fight to try and make
positive change. And I think it's we're most concerned with

(30:32):
the work at the end of the day. Man. That's
that's one thing I'm most proud of, you know, being
a task force member and and being a supporter and
an advocate is is with the Poliner schoolish and it's
about the work. It's about the work, it's about the people,
um And as long as it's about that, I'm all
for it. I'm all for fighting for the issues, and
we're doing it together. When you got a collection of guys,

(30:54):
just it's more than just NFL guys, it's more than
just basketball guys. Has becoming a cross and soccer and
and and different sports all across the globe that wants
to find a way to make it better for people,
and we want to do it together and and and
in this day and time, that's just not something you
hear a lot about and not something that you hear
as collaborative. It's not a it's not a collaborative nature.

(31:15):
It's just not something that people want to do enough.
And I'm just glad to we're able to do that
on a consistent basis. Kelvin, what have you been most
pleased with in terms of your work with the coalition
in terms of tangible change that you've made. You know,
I can think about UM some of the things that
were that were that were done up in Massachusetts with

(31:35):
the mccordy twins, how they were able to bring down
the age of of you know, some of the things
that we're going on in juvenile I think about the
police reform, community reform that um ankorin is done down
in uh down in Florida. I think about some of
the tactical town halls that we've had in different states

(31:55):
around some of the elected officials that were happening. We
don't say this is the official that needs to be elected.
We don't say this is the person that we need
to vote for. All we want to do is have
a conversation and let the people make the decision as
best for them. So I think for us, I think
what I've felt, and I'm not gonna say that there's
one accomplishment that that out um that outperforms another one.

(32:15):
But I think the fact that we've brought issues to
the table and we've made sure that those issues are
talked about, and then if there are ways for us
to actually have an action item and to be able
to work towards something, I'm super appreciative, appreciative of that,
you know. For me, I spent a lot of time
on the education side. That's why I've spent uh my
entire career. And being able to have conversations with people

(32:37):
you know, within the last administration and now with the
new administration about some of these issues. UM, for me,
that's been super accomplishing to be able to have a
conversation with the former chairman of the FCC, you know,
during the height of COVID talking about these very issues
and making sure that people have access to to you know,
to to watch you know, WiFi, you know, broadband hotspots,
et cetera. Those things have been important. But it's hard

(32:59):
to just points to one thing and say, hey, this
one thing is is what I'm most acco, most most
happy to accomplished, because it's been a collection of things,
and it's been this continuation of bringing other sports, other
folks um to the table and making sure that we
have you know, a way in which we can you know,
provide his voice for for for people who are marginalized.

(33:20):
So it's hard to say that there's just one thing
man um but just one accomplishment, because it's it's an
evolution that's continuing to grow. Speaking to that, what's interesting
to me is that back when the Player's Coalition was
first formed, you guys, to some degree, we're out on
an island very much. There was, Yeah, there was still
that division even among players about how serious are you
guys about doing the work. I wonder now in the

(33:43):
summer of in this age of now people like to say, wokeness,
how did the perception of the Players Coalition and and
and and folks outsiders, how did it change in terms
of how they viewed you all and the work that
you were doing, and how did they want to get
involved at that point? You know, I think, you know,
on on the football side of things, we're always talking

(34:05):
about the iron, the sky don't lie, right, and the
proof is in the pudding. And I think if you
look at the track record of what Players Coalition has
done with the resources we've gotten from not only the
NFL but other um entities across the across the globe,
we've executed on what we said we're going to execute on.
And you think about a winning team, and winning team

(34:26):
is a team is within the execute you know, day in,
the day out, weekend, and we got a month in
the month out, and I can say with the Players Coalition,
we have continued to execute on exactly what we said
what we're gonna do. We've been super transparent, which I
love because I think transparency um provides a level of
trust not only for those within the organization, but those

(34:48):
with you know, outside of the organization. And then I
think that we've won people over just doing the work.
It's not you know, it's not a publicity stunt. It's
not you know, you know pictures here, it's not gal
us here. No, it's about doing the work. And when
you do the work, real people know what real work is.
Real people like yourselves know what real work is. You've

(35:11):
been covering the NFL and athletes for decades upon decades,
y'all know what's real, and y'all know it's not. And
when we can put that information on the internet and
we can send this information over to you all directly
and it's free for everybody to see and everybody to
check us on every single dime that we've gotten every
single dime and we deployed you know, exactly where our
money is and we're not only talking to the top,

(35:32):
but we're walking the walk. And I can say that
that's for me what's most important, and that's changing narratives
because you know, at one point in time we will sellouts.
You know, uh, we we were escapegoats. We we took
NFL money and we ran and you know we're gonna
you know, we we got hush money. I don't, I don't.
I can't say that any person that was involved what

(35:52):
was that two thousand and eighteen, two thousand seventeen can
say that this was hush money. Um. And again it's
not that we're is crediting anybody else has done anything
within this landscape. We're all about being collaborative. But what
we set out to do we've done. We've executed on
exactly what we set out to do. We laid plan
out and we went and executed. And for me, that's

(36:14):
that's all that I feel you need to do. And
I think and in a in a business worst performance
based you all talk about it all the time, performance
based business, and we know how we need as a
whole another conversation for another day regarding coaches and gems
within the National Football League. But we know the performance
based business and as as as players. When we put

(36:35):
this thing together, we knew we had to be data driven,
performance based driven. We have to be results driven, and
we've done that, Um and I can't speak to that.
The proof is in the putt and check the track record. Well, Calvin,
you gave us a great jumping off point because Jim
and I have been talking about something off season long
and talked about it's about the work, right, and so

(36:57):
Jim and I had all started like this when the
NFL said we're gonna play lift every voice and sing
the black national anthem, thank you. That's our response. Folks
who didn't see it. Kelt threw his head back because
it was all we all thought that was grandstanding, right,
like nobody asked for that, but we are asked for
helping to fix the digital divide and judicial reform and

(37:20):
civic reform and things like that. So just I mean
again from the spokesn for the player's coalition, the hashtags,
the symbols on the field, that you know again some
things again that that we're publicly symbolic, but was that
the real work? You know, is that something that could

(37:41):
be as impactful as as you guys taking the time
you're doing to meet with legislators and the things that
you do. You know, I'm not gonna talk about what
they did, UM, I'm gonna talk about what we did.
And we stayed the course and did the work, you know,
in spite of the different hashtags, the different slogans, the

(38:02):
you know, I think it was needed. You know, they did,
but they needed to do to appease I guess they're
more compass in a way, you know. UM. But we
stayed the course and did the work that we were
that were called to do. And that's the work that
that we've been doing, UM around police and community relations,
criminal justice reform, UH, education and economic nobility. We we've

(38:25):
continued to work within those lanes no matter what, no
matter if we've planned lift every voice, no matter if
we're you know, talking about say your name, which I
think is super important, UM, but we've continued to do
the work. UM. And I think you know, I'm gonna
take this time to say it. You know, if if
they were really about it, we'll find a way to

(38:46):
make sure that when coaches and gms and presidents come
up for opportunities to to to be able to be
influential with them organizations, we make sure that that's done. Um.
And if I need to get more granular and say
exactly what I need to say, we need to make
sure that black coaches get hired and gems, black gems
get hired, and black presidents get hired, as simple as that.

(39:06):
Because you can't have a coach go from being the
Titans coach to a head coach. I don't know we
can just jump the line like that, but that ain't
for this podcast about. But that's where you can actually
it is we can go there. We can always go
there always. You know, it's always the right time to

(39:29):
address the wrong thing. So um, yeah, no, so if
you want to take it there, we can go there. Yeah.
You know, it's it's it's just it's just hard watching man,
you know. I mean I think Steve said this a
minute ago. We started. You know, it's a hone of
your dash and you get a uh, you know, I
would say at this point, I mean it's like a

(39:50):
freaking seven yard head start, you know. Um, it's like
the goal keeps keeps moving. Um. And it's I mean,
it's just it's it's hard watching, you know. I was.
I was super happy. I mean just elated to see tybows,
you know when it's when a Super Bowl, you know,
a couple of weeks ago, I was, I was with
him in New York. UM, and I saw what went

(40:12):
on in that organization. UM. And to see him go
and thrive in spite of how he was treated in
that organization, UM. For me, again, he just did the work.
He did the work with the time, and he had
to staff that he needed to hire and he went
and when the next uter so to see him do
it in that fashion, it was, it was it was
magical to watching man. So to be able to show

(40:34):
the world what they missed out on, it's a it's
a beautiful thing. You know. I always say this, Kevin.
You know, people say, well, they should owners should be
able to hire the most qualified. And I said, you're
absolutely right. I agree with you hire the most qualified.
And if we're trying to do this subjectively, then fine,
let's do blind resumes. Then let's put him up on

(40:54):
a board with no name on it, and let's see
whose resume shows that someone is truly qualified. I'm willing
to wage you right now, and I'm not a betting man,
but I'm willing to wager right now that if I
were to put up a blind resume of a Gym Caldwell,
of an Eric b enemy of a Pep Hamilton's versus

(41:15):
a Nick Sirianni or Dan Campbell or someone else. Objectively speaking,
I don't see any way you can. You can, you
can select that other group. I'm just being honest about it, man.
I would put another name in their Brandon Hunt, you know,
put put putting up versus any other candidate that's no

(41:42):
where Who did you come from? Who is Eddie? Who
his daddy used to scoff for? No, just put the
names up there, and not even names, just like you said,
just put the resumes up there. What they've done in
the role that they've been in, what the team that
they've been on have done, why they were there in
that particular role. And again let's let let's let the

(42:04):
track work and speak for itself. You know, as players,
we we were literally judged by what is on film.
That's it. It don't matter how you felt, It don't
matter if your mom died, if your dad died, you know,
you have somebody to die from COVID that was close
to you, if your wife had a miscarriage. None of
this stuff matters on Sunday when they put that film on.

(42:25):
They don't care. They don't want to care. That's just
the nature of our business. So why is it that,
you know, when we get behind closed doors now, it's like, man,
who is your daddy? And where did you come from?
What school would you go to? And you know which
back over here did you scratch? Which back over here
did you scratch? Man, get get away from all that.
I just let it be objective and let the chips

(42:46):
fall where they fall, as simple as that. Let the
chips follow they fall based on exactly what their track
work and what they put on film STAPs, as simple
as that. And it's just again, it's it's it's it's
hard send it. As a player, and I played for
two black coaches man I played, I played for my
time and I played for Top Bowls. I played for
some Caucasian coaches. I've had off some of my coaches

(43:08):
that have been white, blue, green, the whole nine. I
see it and to see it and to see, you know,
people passed over so many times. I mean, that's why
I was so elated to see Adrian Claim get the
job in Pittsburgh. Man. You know, that doesn't happen too often.
It just doesn't. So it's meant to see Claim get
that job. Man, was was a step forward? Is it

(43:29):
the Is it the end all be all? Not at all,
Jason Wright? You know, getting getting to hit the head
job on the business side of the house there in Washington.
It's a great step forward. But I mean, I know
it's a whole a whole crew of folks that can
go and do that role at a number of organizations
across the National Football League. And you can be on
my soapbox. Who wants suppe be talking about this? But

(43:51):
there there there's there's no ground there's no ground rules here, Calvin.
It's the hut on Flow podcast. Bro We Flow. Flow
is Flow is the second part of this. It's in
the title. So this is what we do. Part of
the Digital Vibe Divide is providing educating people. You need
to digital divide to educate people. So you are educating
people right now. So I'm just trying to use the

(44:13):
historical lens. Man, when I'm thinking about it, and when
I'm trying to educate, because if you look at history
and looks at the historical narratives that have continued to
play in our league. I mean, you got rid of
gym call in New York, I mean in Detroit after
he went nine and seven multiple times went to the playoffs.
And have they even had a shot at the playoffs
since then? No, But they're drafting high every year. That

(44:37):
that's that's for me. That that's again just looking at, uh,
the track record of some of these folks, it's just
it's just mind blow. It's just mind blow. Man. The
thing is I can say this stuff man, is is
you know, I'm I'm you know, when you get you
get to two multiple years in the league, man, you
kind of just let your mouth just go where you
want ago because you really don't care what anybody got
to say. How are you gonna be treated? Um, because

(45:00):
you know what you have to say is right, and
it'd be different about the line you know about tie
bowls exactly, I'm not a line. I mean just just
look at look look at what the track circuses. I mean,
people try to go there time and every year. Well
he needs to the dude been coaching for over a decade.
I mean, he ain't missed it, has never had a
losing Yeah they were Hey, they were undefeated two games

(45:24):
in the row, and people are like, oh, Tim was
losing it. He ain't got there was They were loving. Though.
We have coaches that you know, go have losing seasons
for two straight years and they've still got a job,
and we need to see if they can make it.
We can see if they can make it work. Now, Yeah,

(45:45):
we see. We see the Adam Gaateses of the world
get fired in one place and within hours have a
job someplace else. So come on, Math, we're being real
about all of this. And he ain't the only one,
but I mean, I mean here, here's here's the thing too, though,
from where where Jim and I sit right, we now

(46:07):
have an opportunity to give voices to you and the
others and where we can talk about this. This is
this is what we are trying to do in our
realm because there aren't too many mediums broadcast, print, whatever,
where this can happen. And we see how these coaches,
certain coaches take care of other people in the media
to get those certain stories out and certain Hey man,

(46:29):
this is all one right here. You know, Jim, Jim
and I and I bought and sold, we we and
we give, We give everyone on who come on our
show every opportunity to say their piece, and so that
this is what we do. Okay, let's go in a
different direction. This is kind of an on field direction
to some degree, a bigger picture. Right, you're a free agent.
We're hearing all this talk about free agency. With a

(46:51):
salary cap coming down, we're gonna see a lot of
veteran players getting cut. We've seen guys at Kwan Short
and j J. Watt. Uh. You know, some some players
are already getting cut as teams are trying to under
the cap. What about the uneasiness of being a free
agent or is it uneasy in these types of scenarios
where again I wonder if they're going to use excuses
to trim salaries because the overall cap is coming down. Well,

(47:14):
first I need to address the elephant in the room.
If you're the right color, you can get released, um
very easily. You know, that's what happened in Houston, because
it's a guy that's on that schoad that's trying to
get traded out of that same place and he can't
get traded. So sorry to be on my soapbox. You
allowed the opportunity for me to do that, so I
did that already. Uh but wait wait wait wait wait
wait wait yeah, I can wait, but I guess on

(47:37):
that one. Yeah. Number one, you don't let franchise quarterbacks,
twenty five year old franchise quarterbacks walk out the building
and and you know I'm there with you, my brother,
Well you versus Carson Wentz, you should allow him to
at least if he if he if he's your if

(47:58):
he's your a guy, aren't you doing everything to make
sure that you're gout is taken cred of, just like
you've done for every other quarterback in the National Football League.
I'm not disagreeing with that at all. Yeah, I'm just
saying there's no way I'm letting agree. This is why
I agree what our question but our question. So you
know that I I agree with you on that point.

(48:19):
But to your your question, Steve, It's the thing is
is I've been down this road a number of times already. Um,
this is my fourth time being a free agent, but
but not with a diminishing salary cap, not with these circumstances.
That's true. But I would say even last year being
a free agent was even harder than this year because
we had no idea who's gonna even have a football season.

(48:40):
So to be a free agent not knowing that you're
gonna have a football season is you know. At least
this year we know we're gonna have it's gonna be
a season. We just noticed salary cap is decreased by um,
you know, a couple of million, um. But I would
saying done done. The uneasy. The uneasiness is in the
very fact that, yes, I am an older player. UM,

(49:04):
I understand that the body of work is what it is.
But at the same time, you can go and get
a twenty two year old to to play, Um, you know,
sixteen seventeen, it's gonna be seventeen games now. So you know,
there are a lot of questions that, uh continue to
go through my mind. But I think the best way
that I've been able to handle is is control what

(49:24):
I can control, you know, Kelvin, We heard J. C. Treader,
president of the nfl p A, say late in the
season that what this season, what last season, the COVID
season had taught him is that all of that on
field work in the off season it's not necessary. And
I wonder from your standpoint, I know you're a veteran,

(49:45):
so you're probably in favor of less work on the
field in the off season. So I'm setting it up
on a t for you, But what are your thoughts
about some of the changes that things that were done
during the COVID off season that can be moved forward
and should have an I packed on on how teams trained.
You know, I think j C first and foremost hit

(50:05):
the nail on the head there. We're the only sport
that has this type of off season set up, and
we're the most brutal, most violent sport on the planet,
you know, So to be able to limit UM some
of the exposure, even though it's not as violent in
the off season, to be able to limit someone exposure
is worth it. At this point. I think one of
the great things that came out of this particular UM

(50:27):
season was the ramp up period during training camp. So
I'm I'm of the you know, of the of the
crowd that says, hey, once the season is over, don't
bring us back until like late July or like you know,
early July, right after July four, So we have that
ramp up here that ramps us right into training camp,

(50:49):
right into the season, and we go and do what
we need to do because that's all you're doing. And uh, April,
you're pretty much ramping us up to ramp us, back down,
to ramp us, back up, to ramp us back down.
Then go in the train an account. Why not just
have the whole ramp up period all at one time,
like that's what happened this year. Because the thing is is,
if here's the thing. If you say that we're men,

(51:11):
we're pros, allow us to be treated like men and pros.
You don't need to be babysitting us in April May,
in mid June. If we're prose, allow us to be pros.
Let me let me give you a real quick the
two Devil's advocate things I hear. Number one, you hear
coaches say it's less about the veterans than it is
the young players. We need to we need to break

(51:33):
them in. They need the training. And the other thing
you'll hear from young players, whether it's rookies, undrafted or whatever,
is from a financial standpoint, it benefits them to be
able to be in the building, to use all the facilities,
the resources, all those sorts of things. Are those two
valid in your mind? The first one, I don't think
it's valid because you had a rookie that winning broke

(51:56):
the rookie receiving record broke. I think it's Calvin Johnson's
record from my minstay in Minnesota, right, right, that was
a rickie that broke that record, right. Yeah, I don't
know if I don't know if he broke the rookie record,
but no question he was outstanding. I know he broke
the franchise record, right, this franchise record. So for me,
it's it's hard to say that, um, young players are

(52:17):
not Willie and capable to come in and still go
and perform. You still, I mean, you had a rickie
quarterbacks that came in performed, You had rookie receivers that
came and performed. You had the right tackle for the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers who ended up playing in the Super
Bowl and starting the Super Bowl was a rookie. So
I think it's hard. It's hard to say that, you know,
young players don't have an opportunity to to be prepared
and ready, you know, I'm not saying that we need

(52:39):
to cut out the opportunity to be able to have
the ability to go into the to the building in
all season. I've been stopping a by the building a
couple of times during all season, you know, getting COVID tests,
checking in, making sure that you know, things with my
body are right. So I don't think that you're that
you know, we're saying that you can't have an off season.
I think that you can have an off season. I

(52:59):
just don't think that we need the the O T
a type of feel got you and of course con
the the learning the system work happens online digitally digitally
where we need to have, you know, the good WiFi
services and whatnot. So you know, all that note is
we button this up. I mean, what about the work
you're doing with with into it um to help the

(53:22):
digital divide and things like that. You know, the work
we're into it has been organic, has been real, and
it's been authentic. You know what they've done is they've
been able to to help twenty under this undeserved UM
and underserved UM communities across the country. They set up
the into it Prosperity Hub. But they've been able to

(53:42):
talk about I've been able to help young people gain
those twenty first century skills. We talked about this earlier
on in the podcast, but making sure that everybody within
the ecosystem is that the students, the teachers, the parents,
everybody plays a role in this particular UM you know situation.
If we got going on with the digital divide and
I would I have to I would be remiss to

(54:04):
say that into what has done a phenomenal job of
putting their money with their mouth is UM and I've
had the ability to work with them over the past
couple of months and it really just been impressed by
how they've continued to not only put the money with
their mouth IS, but they've actually been undergroundwork working with
UM districts, UH people at the state and local level.
UM it just decided to continue working with them well,

(54:26):
and we're we're happy for him too because they continue
to sponsor the Huddle and Flow podcast, which this week
was highlighted by Kelvin Beach and Kelvin Jim and I
just mad love for the work you're doing, the Player's
Coalition for you speaking your truth. My brother y'all started it.
Did we gonna We're gonna try and finish it too,

(54:48):
I know, I know, that's why. That's why I love
you guys. Man, so so thankful for y'all having me
on this, even Stephen. My time covering the Players Coalition,
I often hear people say what are the players doing?
What impact are they having? And Kelvin Beecham is one

(55:09):
of those guys who, to me personify as the player coalition,
someone who is not looking for headlines, someone who might
not be a big name, but they are out there
doing the work. And I couldn't respect him more for that,
and I think that unfortunately, I hate it when people say,
you know, what are they doing? What impact are they having?
You know, if you really did your homework and you

(55:30):
studied it, you know fairly quickly that there are a
number of players who might not be household names, but
who are making a tremendous difference in households across this country. Well,
I'm gonna change gears a little bit because you know,
we we haven't talked about HBC sports in a minute,
but now hp FO HBC football is back in the

(55:51):
spring and we saw over the weekend Dion Sanders, our
old colleague, the Hall of Fame Cornerback now the head
coach at Jackie State University. They get off to a
fifty three to zero debut victory over Edward Waters College.
But unfortunately that wasn't the story postcame. Dion shows up
and Emily says, I'm happy for the win, but I'm

(56:12):
angry because somebody broke into the coaches locker room stole
some of my merchandise out of a private bag that
I had there. School comes out and issue a statement says, no,
that was just misplaced, nothing was stolen. Dion comes back
and says publicly on Twitter, oh no, that's a lie
if anyone's saying my stuff was not stolen. So now
we've got the narrative of instead of these kids in

(56:34):
the coaching staff celebrating this victory of one of the
few black college games that we've seen because COVID has
postponed everything, now we're talking about what's happening at jack
And State, an incredibly proud and important program to HBCU sports,
and you know this, this is there's a there's a
lot of a lot of feelings I had over this gym,

(56:56):
but I kind of want to get your thoughts on
this kind of seeing it from a fall are and
from the information that you know that's been put out
there about this whole situation. Yeah. My my first feeling,
Steve was said, this is something that should have been
handled internally. I didn't feel like after a game and
knowing that you were going to have national media coverage,

(57:18):
that this is what you wanted to put out, this
is what you wanted to give to the world. The
other thing that I will say to you, To me,
what made me uncomfortable is reading the story about the game,
reading the stories about UM just that entire day, I
felt that the focus was so much on Dion Sanders

(57:39):
and not on Jackson State, and that that disturbed me
a little bit. Look, I understand that Dion is the show,
and him being there is bringing attention to HBCUs and
HBCU football that it might not otherwise have. I get that.
But maybe it's just me and that old man, you know,
as I get older and I mean become of my grandfather,

(58:00):
father or my father, where I'm like, it's not about you,
it's about that program. As you say, that proud program,
And to all of a sudden, like when I heard
the uniforms that they wore were red. I'm like, that's
just not Jackson States colors. There's a there's a there's
a tradition behind that blue and white that Jackson State wears.

(58:22):
I have not heard what the reason was for the red,
but they wore red, and then all the coaches wore
the blue, but Dion wore red. And I'm thinking, Okay,
I know that sometimes a coordinator will wear a color
so that the players on the field can spot them
more easily. Is that what was happening here? I'm not

(58:43):
so certain. And then to come into the postgame interview
with your own personal letterman's jacket, so to speak, that
said more about that spoke more to you than it
did to the university. That made me uncomfortable. So look,
I'm saying all this, and I'm sure I'll be called
a hater and this set and the other, but I

(59:04):
believe in the in the traditions, I believe in the program,
and I believe that no one is bigger than the program.
And unfortunately, at this moment, I feel like everything is
about Dion and not about Jackson State football. Well, I mean,
like you said that, I mean I think initially it's
gonna be about Dion because it's den right, and he's

(59:24):
going to coach the former player going to coach historically
black college. We we we we have. But but yeah,
but here's where I'm gonna pushed back on that, Steve.
The attention is going to come to Dion regardless regardless
if he's if he's wearing a Jackson State letter miss jacket,
that attention is still going to be there. But when
that that letter miss jacket says DS and prime, coach

(59:46):
prime and all of these things, now it appears that
you're putting the focus on you, right, Well, I mean
that that's not. Now is where it's about to get interesting, Jim,
because you're gonna get into their into their conference schedule.
I mean they've got miss to be Vale, Grambling, Alabama,
Alabama State, Prairie View, you know, all of these schools
coming up. So it's this attention going to continue to
stay on him. And what's to me the real intriguing

(01:00:09):
part about this. Right, So, this is the second time
there are headlines about Dion getting robbed. Remember somebody stole
his boom box out of his vehicle a couple of
weeks ago. So now the community of Jackson, Mississippi, Jackson
State University, They're in an odd spot like, Okay, we
we invited d n in. We love the celebrity, we

(01:00:30):
love the attention, But now the attention is going on
the negativity of of of him being robbed a couple
of times, the attention is going on the university or
someone from the university being called a liar for trying
to say his stuff was misplaced and not stolen. So
where is this relationship going? Because Dion has gone out
and recruited a bunch of really talented kids who are

(01:00:52):
on the on the books to come in next year,
is he gonna be around that long? Because right now,
after one game a a just convincing fifties nothing victory,
this seems like it's headed in a direction where they're
not gonna you know, he's not gonna be there for
a while. I mean, and I know Dion from working
with him here at the Network, and I just think
he's all the way authentic. I think if he's gonna commit,

(01:01:14):
he's gonna commit. But the fact now that the City
of Jackson's community that's robbed their head coach twice, there's
been criminal activity about property twice, and then the university
being called liars, like, Yo, we're just getting started here.
We just kicked off our first game, and this is
where we are. When you say he's gonna commit, he'll commit,

(01:01:37):
I would ask you what is he committing to that?
And that's what we don't know. Yeah, that's really what
we're gonna commit to. These kids? Who are who are?
You know? He got people transferring? Yeah, I guess I'm
not gonna get that far down the road because I
don't know, and I've not spoken to Dion. I don't
know what his objective was overall objective in terms of

(01:01:58):
taking this job. If he views it simply as a
stepping stone or one and done or whatever, I have
no idea, So I don't want to speak on the
man's character from that standpoint. All I'm speaking to is,
and I'm acknowledging it up front, this is we are
different personalities. I don't like the attention the way he does,
so I'm putting that out there, and that's why I'm

(01:02:20):
saying some of what I'm saying. It makes me uncomfortable
that I see more focus on him and him attempting
to bring more focus to him than I do on
the program itself, Like that press conference, I didn't hear
anything about what one of how the players performed in
terms of individually or collectively as a unit. I didn't

(01:02:44):
hear anything about that. I don't even know who their
players are at this point, because all all I saw
and the stories that I read out of that was
boy Dean Sanders put on a heck of a press
conference going off about some of this stuff being stolen.
And to me, that's unfortunate because the end of the day,
in my mind, at least, it should still be about

(01:03:04):
these young men. And here's where I am with you
on that, And I'm glad you said that, as us
being HBCU grads, as me being very involved with the
Black College Football Hall of Fame. Right, listen to some
of the great coaches who have come through Jackson State,
John Merritt, W. C. Gordon. These are legends. These are

(01:03:27):
guys who are right there with Jake Gaither and Eddie Robinson.
These are legends, right who put young men in the NFL,
who put young men into the workforce in society, who
have done great things. You've touched a lot of lives
being football coaches. Most people don't know their names. Now,
they weren't NFL Hall of Fame players, but they were

(01:03:48):
about their guys, right, and some of those guys included
Harold Jackson, one of the best wide receivers of his era,
Lem Barney, Robert Briz, You'll Walter Payton, Coy Bacon, Jackie Slater. Right,
these are some of the grist guys to ever play

(01:04:08):
in the NFL four Hall of Famers Pro Football of
Famers in that list. All the other guys I mentioned
are black college football Hall of Famers, and there are others.
That's what it's about. It is legacy, it is history,
and yeah, right now this thing going on is is
off to a real funky start. Hopefully all of this now,

(01:04:30):
Dion kind of gets again when I see guys like
John Merritt, W. C. Gordon is their legends. Man, you're
sitting in there in their chair coaching on their field.
I mean, this is this is where you want to be.
So hopefully they can get through this. This is a
bad window and we can push on some more great

(01:04:51):
things again to bring HBCU athletics back to the forefront. Jim,
before we get out of here, I want to let
people know that you have a great story coming out
speaking of this on uh Black Quarterbacks in the end,
if you can tell us a little bit about that, Yes, Steve.
It just goes back to a conversation you and I
had with Doug Williams before week two where he said

(01:05:12):
to us before we came on the podcast, hey, do
you guys realize you know, we've got four games where
the starting quarterbacks um facing off are all black. And
I hadn't thought about it, and there was no discussion
about it anywhere, And it just got me to thinking,
is that a sign that maybe we've moved past race

(01:05:32):
in the evaluation process of quarterbacks? And so I just
decided to ask people from a historical standpoint, um if
they feel that way. So I spoke to warm Moon,
Doug Williams, Shack Harris, Um, Tony Dungee, Byron left, which Um,
Jimmy Ray and just to get their thoughts, and it

(01:05:54):
was sort of a mixed bag. You know. Some said
they believe it's no longer a factor. Others said they
still believe it's a factor. And we know that this year.
I believe two of the top four prospects at the
quarterback position are black in this upcoming draft, and so
it seems kind of timely just in terms of what
they think about it. And I'll tell you this, will Steve,

(01:06:17):
and then we can get out on this. The one
fascinating stat in the whole story to me is like everyone,
not everyone, but many people point to draft is being
sort of what they believe, sort of the flashpoint, the
turning point and how black quarterbacks were viewed. And if
you remember that year, there were three quarterbacks who were
black who were drafted among the first eleven picks, and

(01:06:41):
including two of the first three, with Donovan McNab, Achilles
Smith and Dante Colepepper. Well, what's interesting to me is
that that's the flashpoint, and that's progress. It wasn't until
twenty seventeen, eighteen years later that we had a draft
and with multi a pool, black quarterbacks were taken in

(01:07:02):
the first round. That's crazy, I know, That's what I'm
saying to you. So was it really progress? Was that
really a flashpoint in terms of the beginning making it
what you will? But that that's just that's sort of
the impetus for the story. Well, i'm sure past hey,
but I'm sure it's great story because everything you do

(01:07:24):
is on point. J T. We want to know my brother,
why don't you take his home? A man? Yeah? We
we thank you for subscribing, We thank you for listening.
We thank you for leaving us your comments about what
you'd like to hear from us, who you'd like to
hear from, et cetera. Please continue to do that. That
way we can continue to give you more of what

(01:07:47):
you're funking for. That's right. Maybe the off season, but
it's never the off season for the Huddle and Flow Podcast.
All right? From a man Jim Trotter, Our producer Thomas
warned the ones and twos, I am Steve White. You
remember we are brought to you by Into It, the
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