No longer that 'Merica

Back in the mythic day, Coach would have made the kid run gassers 'til his lungs collapsed.

Talk back to Coach? Tell him oh, hell, no, this is not acceptable?

Shoo.  Coach woulda made him do up-downs until he not only surrendered his lunch but yesterday's, too. He'd have thundered MY WORD IS LAW, SON. He'd have told him he was THE COACH, and he'll wear any damn T-shirt he pleases, and if he wants the kid's opinion about that he'll TELL HIM WHAT IT IS.

But ...

But this is not back in the day.

This is a different day, a new day, a day in 'Merica when those who've traditionally had to keep their mouths shut and their heads down have decided not to do that anymore.

And so when Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy turned up in a photo rocking a One America News Network T-shirt, his star African-American running back, Chuba Hubbard, took issue with him on social media. Said he "will not stand for this." Said it was "completely insensitive to everything going on in society, and it's unacceptable."

Chuba Hubbard never ran a single gasser for doing that. Which no doubt dismayed that segment of America who think the country hopped on the handcart to hell the day Coach was told he couldn't drag a kid around by the facemask just for looking at him funny.

But Hubbard had a point. OAN, you see, is not really a news network. It's a toystore for fringe righties who see the evil hand of George Soros behind everything Our Only Available Impeached President screws up. It's a loony conspiracy site currently favored by OOAIP himself as his go-to "news" source.

One of the loony conspiracies OAN is currently spinning from ether is that the Black Lives Matter movement is a "farce." Given the current national mood, you can imagine how seeing Coach pimping the site went over with the African-American players who thickly populate Coach's roster.

Even Gundy, not notably the sharpest tool in the shed on occasion, seemed to get that. And so instead of making Hubbard drop and give him twenty, he called a meeting with his players in which he kinda-sorta apologized for being so tone-deaf to "a very sensitive issue."

He didn't have a choice, really. No sooner had Hubbard hinted that he was essentially going on strike ("I will not be doing anything with Oklahoma State until things CHANGE") than his teammates, and even former players, began weighing in with messages of support.

So Gundy had a nascent player revolt on his hands. He'd also ticked off some extremely well-off alums, such as NFL players Justice Hill and A.J. Green III.

The latter, to be frank, might have motivated Gundy more than the former. Money, after all, still talks loudest in major college football. So you never want to make the guys with the fat checkbooks unhappy.

And back in the mythic day?

Well, back in the mythic day -- 1969, to be exact -- a group 14 African-American football players at Wyoming were kicked off the team simply for asking to wear black armbands against BYU, whose players had subjected them to racial epithets the year before. It was hardly a demand; the players all agreed if head coach Lloyd Eaton said no, they'd play anyway. Their presence alone as African-Americans would be their protest.

Eaton wasn't buying. He told them they were defying him simply by approaching him with the request, told anyone who tried to speak to shut up, and kicked them off the squad, saying they could go to (traditional black colleges) Grambling or Morgan State or go back to "colored relief."

Of course, he could do and say those things. First of all, it was 1969. Second, there were only 14 players involved, and no one else stood up for them. And, third, the administration, fans and alumni largely backed Eaton's play.

Fifty-one years later, a few things have changed, clearly.

And thank God for it.