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Richard Sherman Says the NFL Should Be More Like the NBA When it Comes to Player Activism

"They do their best to suppress players' personalities and uniqueness and do their best to uphold the shield."

There's not much Richard Sherman can do without it making noise. Most every time he does a thing, the Internet makes it A Thing. (Remember the postgame tirade heard round the world?) So, when news broke that the all-star cornerback recently brokered his own deal with the San Francisco 49ers—the rival of his former Seattle Seahawks team, whose NFL-best "Legion of Boom" defense he helmed and led to a Super Bowl victory in 2014—Sports Twitter went to work.

Some of the subsequent noise came in the form of criticism from those who thought Sherman left money on the table by negotiating a deal without the seasoned eye of an agent. Some of it came from angry Seattle fans burning his jersey. Sherman, never one to back down, penned a piece on the Players' Tribune reminding fans that Seattle released him first, and arguing that, coming off a season in which he had surgery on both of his Achilles tendons, he negotiated the best deal he could have (three years, up to $39 million, if he hits all of his incentives).

All of which is to say: when Sherman takes the field next season in a 49ers jersey, expect it to be loud.

In conversation with GQ, Sherman talked about his new suit line—RSPCT Suits by Richard Sherman—why it bothers him when people choose to call him "well-spoken," and what NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell could stand to learn from the NBA about empowering his players.


GQ: So you just started this suit line. When was the first time you became conscious of your own personal style?
Richard Sherman: I've always really liked how I looked in a suit. When I was a little kid, I'd put them on and I always thought it was professional—it gave you a different kind of swagger and demeanor, so I've always enjoyed dressing up with a suit on.

I just wanted a more affordable way for kids to get suits, and people in general. In order for you to get those nice suits, and a nice shirt, it'll cost you a $1,000—$700-800 at the minimum.

Do you have a go-to lucky suit?
If I'm feeling some type of way, I'm wearing all black: Black on black on black on black with a bow tie. So it's not really [a] go-to, but that's what I'm wearing if I'm feeling like I'm about to go do some damage.

A lot of noise has been made about your recent move to San Francisco. How much of the noise do you hear?
I don't really listen to much of it. I've said what I had to say about it, and that's pretty much the end of the attention I pay towards it.

In your welcoming press conference, when addressing how you negotiated your own deal, you said agents feel uncomfortable with players taking their own initiative.
The biggest threat to agents is an educated player. A lot of them take advantage of players being financially illiterate, or just being lazy at times and not wanting to go through the process of being informed, or people being intimidated in negotiations. They do one year of work and get paid for three, four years of service, and it doesn't matter if the bonus is [something] the player has to fully earn. "Hey, you get $500,000-600,000 dollars for rushing for 2000 yards," which is all the player, and he still has to give 3 percent to an agent who actually did nothing.

There's a lot of people out there saying you could've gotten a better contract if you'd used an agent. How would you respond to them?
There's a ton of bad deals done by agents. Coming off of two lower leg surgeries, there's not many agents that could've negotiated a better deal. They can say whatever they want, but they couldn't have. I got half of my deals guaranteed. What I had with Seattle that wasn't guaranteed at all. They could have cut me at the end of camp and I'd have gotten nothing, no matter what. I get my $5 million, and then you know, if I play, I can make up to $13 million, which is more than I would have gotten with Seattle.

At the end of the day, it's just them trying to downplay and lessen the impact of a player negotiating his own deal. Now, at the end of this deal, in three years, if I've made $39 million, you won't hear a lot of agents saying "Oh my god, look at how great this is." You'll hear them downplaying it like "Oh, they got lucky" or "Man, this is a once in a lifetime"—it will always be another excuse.

How does your competitiveness manifest itself off the field?
It's more in business, the negotiations with companies and trying to influence others. And trying to get people to understand the difference between being average, being good, and being great is mentality. It's not accepting failure. It's all about how you react and respond to that criticism—that determines if you're going to be a champion or if you're going to be somebody watching somebody else win championships.

How'd you come to that mindset?
I guess my parents just not accepting anything but the best in terms of education and academics, and making sure that I fulfilled my potential and didn't let myself down, continuing to push me to understand that at the end of the day, if you succeed, it's you succeeding, but if you fail, you have nobody to blame but yourself.

You were Salutatorian of your high school, right?
Yeah, unfortunately.

What happened? You couldn't get number one?
I feel like they cheated me, they got into the politics of it. But that's a story for a different day.

"When you hear A-Rod speak, or you hear Tom Brady speak, or you hear another high-profile athlete who's not African-American, or whatever the case may be, you don't have to qualify it with, 'Oh, he's so intelligent and well-spoken.'"

Do you know what the Valedictorian is doing now?
No I don't. I know they took something from me that they can't give me back. And it was like probably a hundredth of a thousandth of a point. Something ridiculous. I think they miscalculated the grades, because we took the same classes and got the same grades and it just was—they had more of an eye on the pulse than I did. I had other things going on, so I didn't keep a tight eye on it like I probably should have. I thought it was a fair system but it wasn't.

People always say "Richard Sherman is so smart," or "Richard Sherman is so well-spoken"—what's your reaction to that?
I don't know how to say this... it's like a back-handed compliment in some ways? And the only reason I say that is because when you hear A-Rod speak, or you hear Tom Brady speak, or you hear another high-profile athlete who's not African-American, or whatever the case may be, you don't have to qualify it with that. You don't have to qualify it with, "Oh, he's so intelligent and well-spoken"—it's like, no, he's well-spoken and intelligent, but that's not something you have to explain to anybody, you could just take the point for what it was. It's appreciated, cause it's a compliment in some ways. But it's also saying that that's something that wasn't obvious before I said my first words.

It speaks to the way we code the language in which we talk about black athletes.
Right. It may seem like me being a bit bitter about the situation, but it's just one of those things that after a while you're like, okay, I get it. I'm smart. But I was smart yesterday, and so were all these other guys, but you don't have to mention that every time you talk about them.

I don't think I'd surprise you by saying that people have strong reactions to you, both positively and negatively. I'm curious what you think it is about you that is something of a lightning rod?
Because being genuine and transparent in this day and age is something that you can be critical of. I could be saying the right things, never get to the theme that's outside of the popular ones, never ruffle feathers, never say anything that I truly believe, because I know that it will be a point of contention. There are tons of players that do that: you just fly under the radar. It's less trouble to deal with. [There's] less people on the fence about you. People will say, "I know what I'm going to get out of that guy. [He's] never going to make me uncomfortable when I hear him talk."

And then there are the other people that say, "Hey, this is wrong, and I'm going to say this is wrong because I believe it's wrong, and if you don't agree, I'm not challenging your belief. You can agree or disagree. This is how I feel. I'm not saying this is how you should feel. But this is my personal opinion." And some people will never give that personal opinion.

Why is it important for you to do that?
It's for others. It's for the kids that believe in the same thing I believe. The kids that are going through the same thing I'm going through, the kid that thinks the same way I'm thinking—for him, for her. People have the same problems—we're human beings, you know? We have some of the same opinions, we think the same way. Don't think of me as anything greater than what you are. I'm not perfect.

If you could say something to the younger Richard Sherman who was drafted in 2011, what would you tell him?
I'd tell him, "You are who you think you are."

What do you mean by that?
I just mean exactly that. Believe in yourself and go forward exactly like you planned on. You are who you think you are.

Does this officially mark the end of the Legion of Boom?
I guess it officially marks the end of my membership for the time being. I'm sure they'll hang our jerseys up and continue to remember us as a group. But you know, there's another part of my journey and another team that I expect to help win ballgames and continue to grow.

When I talked with Malcolm Jenkins about a month ago, I asked him whether or not he feels like the NFL does enough to protects its guys. He said he thinks they do a really good job of educating people about concussions and player safety, but that it's mostly concerned with protecting the game and the longevity of football, more than the players. I'm curious how you feel about that.
They do their best to suppress players' personalities and uniqueness and do their best to uphold the shield. And that's what they've always done, and that's what they will always do. It's different from the NBA, who really tries to put their players out there and allow their players to lead and shape the league, and help grow their league. The [NFL] tries their best to protect the shield. If it's in the best interest of the shield, then they'll allow it. If it's not in the best interest of the shield, then it doesn't make sense to them, which is how they have always been.

Why do you think they are that way, instead of adopting a more, sort of player-friendly, NBA.-style approach?
As the owner from the Houston Texans [Bob McNair] said, "You don't want the prisoners running the prison," you know? Much different approach than the NBA.

Did you see his recent comments, about regretting his apology for those remarks?
Yeah, it's in line with what I would believe their mindset is. It's not all of them, because you've got great owners like [Seahawks owner] Paul Allen, who's incredibly progressive and does everything he can to help this world and to help his players and to help his team grow, and would never make comments like that. There are some who have a very archaic line of thinking. [Ed. note: This interview took place before ESPN's Adam Schefter reported Thursday that the Seahawks had postponed a workout with Colin Kaepernick after he declined to stop kneeling this season.]

"When LeBron James or Chris Paul or anybody makes a stand against injustice and something that's wrong, then you'll quickly hear either their owner or commissioner of their league echo those thoughts, and echo support for those players."

He seemed to suggest that he was not speaking about players when he referred to inmates, but that he was speaking about the league executives.
Yeah, that's usually what you would say in a situation where someone just caught you saying something that they didn't think anyone would catch them saying.

With regards to what we were talking about a minute ago, standing up for you what's true to you, there was a lot of conversation and action in the wake of Colin Kaepernick and the movement he started. Do you feel like that's an area where progress has been made?
I think there was a great attempt by the players, and I think there was a lot of progress made from the player side of things. But as you can see, the way that cultural activism is viewed in the NBA and the way they support their players, using the platform to make a difference and take a stand, is much different than the way our league and our commissioner and our owners stand behind our players when they're trying to take a stand to make the world a better place.

How would you empower the players?
By supporting them. When LeBron James or Chris Paul or anybody makes a stand against injustice and something that's wrong, then you'll quickly hear either their owner or commissioner of their league echo those thoughts, and echo support for those players. When our players do it, you'll usually hear silence or, "Those views are the player's, and not the organization's." It is what it is. But it's just the difference.

Do you think that will change any time in the near future?
I have no idea. I'm not a predictor of futures.

This interview has been edited and condensed.