Last year around this time, J.T. Brown went viral. As San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick's national anthem protest began reverberating, Columbus Blue Jackets coach John Tortorella -- preparing for a stint coaching Team USA in the World Cup of Hockey -- said he would bench any player who did the same.
That led Brown, the Tampa Bay Lightning winger and one of about 30 black players in the NHL, to fire off this tweet:
Wouldn't benching a black man for taking a stance only further prove Kap's point of oppression?