Chicagoans to rally for Colin Kaepernick before Chicago Bears game Sunday

CHICAGO – It’s rare for Pierre Glover to miss a Bears game. The Chicago native has been glued to his TV every Sunday for as long as he can remember.

But he won’t be watching the Bears this Sunday.

Glover and other Chicagoans will be outside Soldier Field for a rally to support former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and the messages about racial inequality he attempted to draw attention to by kneeling during the national anthem last season.

“If I missed a Bears game, it’s because something drastic happened,” said Glover, who now prefers to use “X” as his last name. “It’s not an easy thing to do, but I’m fed up. If (the Bears are) not in support of this, then they’re no longer my favorite team and I no longer support them at all. It’s very disappointing that you can support the NFL for this many years and then it’s like they spit in my face.”

The Bears, through a team spokesman, declined to comment on the rally.

The “Standing 4 Kaepernick Protest” was created by Tim Clark, an activist in New York who is organizing similar rallies across the nation for NFL home openers.

Kaepernick, a free agent, went unsigned during the offseason, prompting his supporters to accuse the league of blackballing him for his outspokenness on subjects such as racial injustice and police brutality.

Critics have pointed out NFL teams’ frequent lack of hesitancy to sign players with histories of crime, including domestic violence. Many found hypocrisy in teams signing quarterbacks with little experience or subpar performance records while Kaepernick – who had a 90.7 passer rating and 16-4 touchdown-interception ratio in 12 games for the 49ers last year – remained out of the game.

It has put Commissioner Roger Goodell and team owners in the awkward position of trying to explain why Kaepernick remained unsigned, with Goodell asserting there is no coordinated plan to keep Kaepernick out of the league.

Kaepernick supporters aren’t buying it and are organizing to voice their frustration as the national sports conversation about the quarterback has bled into the national discourse on politics and race.