Colin Kaepernick continues coloring outside the lines, but is NFL career over? | Opinion

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Colin Kaepernick has another project. One of many.

His latest is a children's book called "I Color Myself Different" that was published this week. It's based in part on Kaepernick's life and focuses on adoption, Black and brown love, and accepting ourselves and each other.

Kaepernick answered written questions from Paste BN Sports about his new project. Interestingly, he declined to answer questions about football and a possible return to the NFL.

"Truthfully, the concept for this book had been on my mind for quite some time before I actually sat down to write it," Kaepernick wrote. "My goal with 'I Color Myself Different' is to inspire and empower children — especially Black and Brown children — to move through the world as their best and true selves, to move through the world with confidence and agency in all they do. Tackling themes like identity, adoption, and self-love, 'I Color Myself Different' is actually based on a true story from my childhood.

"When I was in kindergarten, my teacher asked our class to draw our families — a simple assignment, right? Paradoxically, its simplicity birthed a lot of complex feelings for me. I picked up a yellow crayon to draw my white adoptive family and then exchanged it for a brown crayon in order to draw myself. Though I didn't have the language for it at the time, the class exercise was pivotal to how I came to understand the link between identity and difference, as well as how I came to understand what it means to be Black."

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When asked the biggest challenge in doing the book, he added: "This is a hard question. Writing a children's book that engages heavy themes in sophisticated and affirming — yet truthful — ways is no small task. Editorially, one challenge I encountered was how to delicately contextualize themes like identity, adoption, and difference without flattening their nuances.

"So, for example, when I wrote about the concept of 'difference' I was careful to toggle between what 'difference' might mean within the context of transracial adoption and how that might differ from what it could mean out in the world beyond my personal family dynamic. Once I was able to work out these details, illustrator Eric Wilkerson really brought the story to life with his cinematic illustrations. He did a great job!"

All makes sense. All smart answers. Typical Kaepernick.

Yes, Kaepernick has another project. There will likely be many more. But one thing continues to hang over all of Kaepernick's various undertakings: will he ever play in the NFL again?

Kaepernick has reemerged publicly within the past few months and has clearly displayed a desire to return to the NFL. We saw Kaepernick most recently at the Michigan spring game. He was asked back by his former coach with the San Francisco 49ers, Jim Harbaugh, and at halftime had a throwing exhibition.

He worked out last month with another group of receivers including Tyler Lockett from the Seattle Seahawks.

He's made it clear he wants back in the NFL. So why isn't he?

The answer, in many ways, the same as it was not long after he started his protest several years ago.

Kaepernick, in effect, remains blackballed.

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No team will say this publicly, and it's always possible a team could take a chance, but for now, despite teams like the Seahawks and others desperately needing a quarterback, Kaepernick playing in the league again still seems highly unlikely.

Why is this? Again, no one will say this publicly, but there remains a fear (and to me an absurd one) that Kaepernick will speak extensively about his activism and become some sort of distraction.

Teams sign alleged sexual predators, domestic abusers, players who commit assaults, rob people, do hardcore drugs, shoot people and are arrested for driving under the influence, among other things.

Kaepernick isn't a distraction. Deshaun Watson is a distraction.

Kaepernick being out of the league despite showing that he still has the skill to play isn't about anything other than the NFL still wanting to make him pay a price for peacefully protesting.

Meanwhile, off the field, he continues to do remarkable things, including book publishing.

"I'm really proud of what our team at Kaepernick Publishing has accomplished in such a short period of time," he said. "I founded Kaepernick Publishing in 2019 with the goal of elevating a new generation of writers with diverse views and voices. 'I Color Myself Different,' which is a collaboration between us and Scholastic, is actually our second title and our first children’s book.

"Our first title, 'Abolition for the People,' was published in October 2021. It’s an anthology that argues for a future without and beyond policing and prisons. Our third title, 'In the Blink of an Eye'–one we recently announced–comes out on October 18, 2022. It is the autobiography of NBA legend Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf. It’s incredibly powerful. Over the next few months, we'll be announcing our titles to be released in 2023. It's exciting."