Dave Zirin: new NFL role is "Jay-Z’s ultimate hustle"

Hova's doing it again, on a bigger stage.

"You can't hustle a hustler," I wrote in 2011, regarding Jay-Z's willingness to front for Bruce Ratner and Mikhail Prokhorov's Barclays Center.

Jay-Z Isn’t a Sellout, He’s a Capitalist, the Nation's Dave Zirin wrote 8/19/19:

The worlds of sports, social justice, and hip hop are still reeling from the news that Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter, the rap legend and self-branded socially conscious billionaire, has entered into a partnership with the NFL to be the league’s “live music entertainment strategist.” Carter plans to help direct the NFL’s “Inspire Change initiative.”
Immediately, many saw this as an action that broke a de facto picket line where black entertainers—and white performers acting in solidarity—would not do business with the league as long as exiled quarterback Colin Kaepernick remained unemployed for his anthem protests against police violence.

Rather than pressure the league to reinstate Kaepernick, Jay-Z apparently thinks being an insider would be enough to produce some civic value. Or, as Zirin notes, Jay-Z will soon own part of an NFL team, aiming to become one in full.

Concludes Zirin:

Jay-Z is a boss. Colin Kaepernick and [supporter] Eric Reid are workers. It is the interest of workers in the NFL to unite and say that blackballing people for their political beliefs is never going to be OK. It is in the interest of workers to stand up for their colleague. It is in Shawn Carter’s interest to stand up for himself. It’s not “millions and millions” who are going to be helped. It’s one person. It’s Jay-Z’s ultimate hustle—a hustle he told us, over 20 years ago, we were never to knock.