Vikings' Anthony Barr: Players got NFL's attention on social justice, and more is needed

Linebacker Anthony Barr has been involved with the Vikings' social justice committee since its inception in 2017, but Barr said the May 25 killing of George Floyd stirred him to do more.

Barr was one of 18 NFL players, including linebacker Eric Kendricks, who appeared in a June 4 video telling the league to condemn systemic racism, in words that commissioner Roger Goodell repeated in his own response a day later. Barr said "it only felt right to kind of be more proactive than I have been."

"It's the responsibility we have, not only as citizens, but as athletes in the community, especially the event hit so close to home for us with the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis," Barr said Thursday via videoconference. "Put pressure on myself and my peers and my family members to do the same, and it's been a good experience so far, and obviously the work is far from done. I don't know if I'm impacting one way or another, but I'm definitely doing my best."

In the wake of Floyd's murder in the hands of the Minneapolis Police Department, Barr said he felt like players were the driving force in getting more out of the NFL's league office. On June 2, before Goodell's statements acknowledging racial injustice, Barr tweeted: "Your league is built on black athletes. Vague answers do nothing. Let the players know what you're ACTUALLY doing."

"We felt it was a time to apply pressure to the league to make a statement, at the very least," Barr said Thursday. "Whether that was something they truly believed in, or just something to put out there, I think it's important for employees of any organization or company to feel the support of their bosses that kind of run the show.

"At some point they need to acknowledge that there is stuff that isn't right, and you don't need to be afraid of offending people when it comes to justice and equality matters. I think we were able to get the attention of the league on that."

Earlier this month, the league launched "NFL Votes," meant to assist voter registration and civic engagement among players and team and league employees. Voting is a point of emphasis for Barr, who echoed others in calling out the roughly 500 players who didn't vote on the new collective-bargaining agreement in March.

"That was kind of disappointing," Barr said. "So I can only imagine there are a lot of guys who aren't even registered to vote in their own respective states. So that was important, to kind of get a protocol in place this season for every team to get registered and register all their places."

Barr said he also wants to see more diversified coaching staffs, front offices and other team departments.

"Training rooms, equipment rooms, weight coaches, and the list goes on," Barr said. "And obviously, the criteria needs to be met and you're not going to just hand somebody a job. And I think that is an area of focus that the NFL has talked about for some time. But what has really changed?"

The NFL's latest tweaks to the Rooney Rule this spring include requiring teams to interview at least two external minority candidates for head coaching vacancies, and at least one minority candidate for coordinator openings.

Barr isn't a rah-rah player on the field, or the loudest voice in the locker room off the field. But the 28-year-old linebacker said he looked internally before calling out for change elsewhere.

"It was empowering," Barr said. "Felt like the right thing to do. Maybe it was a little uncomfortable but maybe that's what this whole thing is about, right? Making yourself feel a little out of place and making yourself look in the mirror and question things that maybe you've done in the past or things that you've done that need to be changed. It made me a little uncomfortable in terms of being a little more vocal and taking a little bit more of a risk but when it comes to topics of social justice you're not going to make everybody happy."