Colin Kaepernick is filing a grievance suit under the collective bargaining agreement and has hired lawyer Mark Geragos, according to Bleacher Report, a lawyer who has represented high-profile clients such as Michael Jackson, Winona Ryder and NASCAR driver Jeremy Mayfield. An ABC report said the grievance claims owners “colluded to deprive Mr. Kaepernick of employment rights in retaliation for Mr. Kaepernick’s leadership and advocacy for equality and social justice.”
Giants co-owner John Mara said he got a flood of letters this off-season from fans pleading him to stay away from Kaepernick, though he denied the one-time rising star was being blackballed. “Anybody that thinks that there’s been any conversations going on among teams about Colin Kaepernick is crazy,” Mara said on ESPN Radio in August. “That just is not the case. I saw a quote, I think it was (Dolphins owner) Steve Ross recently that said, ‘Teams want to win so badly that if they believe a player can help them win, they’re going to bring him on.’ I think there are certain issues obviously that go along with Colin Kaepernick and that may have scared some teams away, but there is absolutely no blackball going on here. I just don’t see that at all.”At the time, Mara thought Kaepernick would find a job.
It’s Week 6, and the player who brought San Francisco to the Super Bowl in 2013 is still unsigned, even as many quarterbacks have gone down. But commissioner Roger Goodell has denied the league has conspired against signing Kaepernick.“I believe that if a football team feels that Colin Kaepernick, or any other player, is going to improve that team, they’re going to do it,” he said in June. Kaepernick has completed nearly 60 percent of his career NFL passes for 12,271 yards and 72 touchdowns with 30 interceptions over 69 NFL games.