“Am I next?”
As a young Black man in America, Mark McKenzie said these words both inspire and haunt him. And they were on his mind when he and the rest of the Union team replaced their own last names with the names of victims of police brutality for their match against NYCFC on Thursday.
The Union homegrown defender, an outspoken advocate against racism and for equal justice, wore the name of a Tamir Rice, a 12-year old for whom that question that follows McKenzie around had already been brutally answered.
“It was something that emotionally touched me with his story,” McKenzie told reporters late Thursday.