From sponsors to owners, the NFL has a real chance at change.

Doesn’t this nationwide protest supporting Black Lives Matter and against police brutality feel different than all the others that have come before? And the NFL has a real chance to make changes stick.

The Carolina Panthers took a bold step when they severed ties with six-figure sponsor CPI Security after the company’s CEO Ken Gill sent a thoughtless return email that was pushed out on Facebook, and the team joined Hornets owner Michael Jordan in dropping CPI.

This is significant because, in a season that NFL figures to lose hundreds of millions of dollars in ticket sales, these major sponsors are an important revenue stream. And regardless of how the NBA returns to play, it was heartfelt that Jordan came out so strongly when he spent most of his fame not publicly standing up for social injustice.

The league that blackballed Colin Kaepernick for his kneel-down protest against police brutality has admitted that it should have listened more to players about race issues a long time ago. The NFL has been so slow to integrate its coaching ranks that there is actually a rule that any team hiring a head coach must interview one minority.

When one of the white icons of the league like Drew Brees says something offensive that he didn’t think through first, and his teammates almost unanimously call him out on it, that speaks to every age, race and individual liberty of every protester.

So how about Commissioner Roger Goodell encourages teams to give Kaepernick a legitimate tryout, and how about letting players pick what kind of a pre-game moment they want to protest and salute slain citizens like George Floyd.

These moves like punishing insensitive corporate millionaires, whether they be sponsors or owners, need to answer the nation marching in peaceful protest. This is a chance for today’s issues to become part of tomorrow’s game, much like every Major League Baseball Player wears No. 42 on Jackie Robinson Day, and that is more celebrative than symbolic.

The NFL and the NBA can do even better.

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