It was inevitable that a member of the Washington Redskins football team would offer an opinion regarding whether the team should keep its name.
It was inevitable even though quarterback Robert Griffin III said last month that players were advised not to talk about the issue, before amending his comments to indicate that they hadn’t been told not to talk about it. (Which possibly means he was advised to say they weren’t advised to not say anything.)
The most likely player on the roster to break ranks (if ranks even exist) was tight end Fred Davis. And so it was Davis who addressed the issue on Tuesday, in an appearance with LaVar Arrington and Chad Dukes of 106.7 The Fan in D.C.
“[A]t the end of the day, it doesn’t matter,” Davis said. “I mean, you give us a name or not, we’re going to go out there with some new cool jerseys and play football.
“So at the end of the day, it depends. Whatever they do, I can’t really have a say in it, and I could see how it could be kind of offensive. But you know, at the end of the day, I don’t have control of that. All I do is put a jersey on and play football. If they call it Washington Redskins, Fredskins, I mean whatever you want to call it.”
That’s a far cry from a party line that staunchly defends the honor and tradition of the name, questioning the motives and/or sanity of anyone who would see the name as anything other than an acknowledgement of the rich heritage of the people from whom the English stole the country. (Hey, we Italians were lured over here by promises of streets paved with gold — and then told to descend into the bowels of the planet to remove its coal.)
It’ll be interesting to see whether other members of the team decide to chime in on the issue, and whether the issue ever will become as polarizing in the locker room as the debate is becoming outside it.