Fritz Pollard Alliance calls on Washington to change NFL team’s name

Leaders of the Fritz Pollard Alliance are calling on the Washington Redskins to change their name, according to the Washington Post. The alliance, which is responsible for promoting minority hiring throughout the NFL, has spent months attempting to persuade Washington owner Daniel Snyder to meet with Native Americans opposed to the team’s name.

The Fritz Pollard Alliance picked Martin Luther King Jr. Day to voice its opposition to the name in hopes of forcing a change of the controversial name. Leaders have even met with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, who said it was an issue that could only be addressed with Washington.

“As the NFL continues to move in the direction of respect and dignity, one of its teams carrying this name cuts glaringly against the grain,” read a letter co-signed by John Wooten, the alliance’s chairman and a former lineman for Washington. “It hurts the League and it hurts us all.”

Washington has come under intense pressure in recent months to change the team’s name, which some Native American leaders have denounced as a racial slur. To this point, Snyder has remained adamant the franchise will keep the name it has held since 1937.

Last week, the Seattle Human Rights Commission said in a resolution passed that residents of Seattle should boycott corporate sponsors of Washington until Snyder changes the team’s name, according to Seattle PI.

NFL analysts Phil Simms of CBS and Tony Dungy of NBC have said they will no longer refer to Washington’s team name on air, and former NFL referee Mike Carey revealed he was allowed to avoid Washington games for eight years due to his objections to the team’s name.

The Fritz Pollard Alliance is the latest group to voice its displeasure with Washington’s name, but because the leaders are so close to the NFL, they could make a bigger impact in terms of getting Washington to potentially change the name.