Colin Kaepernick confused many upon choosing to wear a Fidel Castro shirt and praising the former leader before the 49ers’ game with the Dolphins this Sunday (and before Castro’s death). Kaepernick sparred with Miami media, defending his decision and later claiming he didn’t support the “oppressive things [Castro] did”. The pick-and-choose revisionist mindset Kaepernick expressed didn’t sit well with second-generation Cuban linebacker Kiko Alonso.
Speaking with Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald (who wrote a scathing piece about Kaepernick’s hypocrisy), Alonso admitted Kaepernick defending Castro made him upset.
“Yeah, it matters,” Kiko said of Kaepernick’s stance. “I didn’t read your article, to be honest. But I did see what happened. So, yeah, there were some feelings on my part.”
Alonso said the comments fueled his performance in a win over the San Francisco 49ers, where the 26-year-old beasted with 12 tackles, a fumble recovery, and an assist on the game’s final play, a hit on Kaepernick.
“You two saw what happened in Cuba first-hand,” Alonso said to his father and me. “I didn’t. But I do have feelings about it. So there was some bad blood there for me with Kaepernick.”
“He’s ignorant,” he said.
“He still has no clue what a ruthless killer of the Cuban people this guy [Castro] was,” Carlos finished.
It’s easy to understand Alonso’s frustration with Kaepernick’s blind statements. Kaepernick has used his platform to influence many on the oppression minorities deal with in day-to-day life. To use the same platform to defend Castro is completely hypocritical and offensive to Cubans who dealt with his oppression for generations. Alonso and those with Cuban heritage should be mad at Kaepernick. Good on Alonso for speaking his mind.
