Twenty years before quarterback Colin Kaepernick knelt on an NFL field, NBA player Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf took a stand by sitting. It was March 1996, and the Denver Nuggets point guard had not been standing up during the playing of the anthem for two weeks without anyone noticing, something that seems impossible now, when every movement can be captured by thousands of smartphones and amplified on numerous platforms.
Once his silent act of protest was spotted, angry fans and pundits vociferously attacked him, with some of the vitriol fueled by xenophobia aimed at the player formerly known as Chris Jackson who had converted to Islam five years earlier. The NBA suspended Abdul-Rauf for one game before the player and the league came to a compromise: He would stand for the anthem but would bow his head with eyes closed, his hands up as he recited an Islamic prayer.
