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Jay-Z’s stray shot at Colin Kaepernick reportedly wasn’t even accurate.
The rapper raised eyebrows when bringing up the former quarterback during a concert at Yankee Stadium. In a freestyle rap addressing his critics, Jay-Z claimed Kaepernick signed a non-disparagement deal when settling a lawsuit in which he accused the NFL of colluding to keep him out of the league.
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“They run out of characters, had to bring back up Kap again,” Jay-Z said. “Buddy took a check, I ain’t even mad at him. But along with that check you have to sign a non-disparagement. I’m the one they can’t control.”
Observers first questioned why Jay-Z chose to publicly go after Kaepernick. Sources are now disputing the facts behind the diss.
According to TMZ, Kaepernick never signed a non-disparagement agreement in his 2019 settlement with the league. The outlet noted that he continued to make critical posts on social media afterward, citing a November 2020 tweet in which the former San Francisco 49ers star counted “1,363 days of being denied employment.”
“As one source put it, ‘Colin couldn’t post about how many days it’s been since a team hired him,’ if he’d agreed not to say anything bad about the NFL,” TMZ wrote.
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More on Jay-Z and Kaepernick
Jay-Z publicly supported Kaepernick after he took a knee during the national anthem to protest racial inequality in 2016. He wore a custom Kaepernick jersey during a 2017 appearance on Saturday Night Live and called the athlete an “iconic figure” in a CNN interview the following year.
He thus received some backlash when his Roc Nation company partnered with the NFL to produce Super Bowl halftime shows. Eric Reid, who joined Kaepernick’s lawsuit against the league, called Jay-Z’s NFL involvement “kind of despicable.”
Kaepernick’s partner, Nessa Diab, also blasted Jay-Z at the time.
“It’s typical for the NFL to buy different PR looks to cover up their dirt,” she wrote on Instagram in 2019. “That’s nothing new. But what is disgusting and disappointing is Jay-Z let them use him. Whether Jay-Z knew it or not (I don’t doubt his intelligence-so I would think he knew) he helped the NFL bury who he said is an iconic figure.”
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This story was originally published July 14, 2026 at 8:26 AM.