The fires and the tear gas and the anguished chants were right outside the window, a 10-minute walk from his apartment in downtown Minneapolis. Rashod Bateman couldn't believe it. It had been only three years since the wide receiver decided to move halfway across the country to play college football for the Minnesota Golden Gophers and live in a city he hoped would offer a much different experience than his hometown of Tifton, Georgia, where he had been stung by casual and overt racism.
"You could hear the riots on campus," he said. "You'd look up and see helicopters flying all over town. One of my best friends ran back to my apartment because he had been tear gassed. It was a tough time emotionally, mentally and even physically. You didn't know what direction anything was -- right, left, up or down."
The death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, transformed Bateman's adopted home into an international epicenter of racial strife. "I never thought in a million years I would be scared to walk outside," he wrote on Twitter, accompanied by a self-portrait with his head down and his face obscured. His life would never be the same.
Bateman -- now a potential top-50 pick in the 2021 NFL draft class -- had snagged the first ticket out of Georgia, accepting the University of Minnesota's early scholarship offer in the spring of 2017. It was in part due to loyalty but mostly for a fresh start. In Tifton, for example, it was not unusual to be side-eyed by people who saw him with the white godmother who helped raise him. Bateman hoped for something different in Minnesota. Now, he realized, there was no escape.
"Being African American in this world, it was kind of normal for it to be that way," Bateman said recently. "But I think with George Floyd being so close, and it literally happening right there in front of my eyes and down the street, like literally being able to walk to where the incident happened, and just seeing how the people in the state reacted, and seeing how some people said that it was OK for it to be that way, and at the same time, our president was not being very respectful of all people, I would say it was just tough to experience."
What followed over the next six months was a blur. Bateman, already among college football's best receivers, emerged as one of its most thoughtful advocates for racial healing. He opted out of the 2020 season after contracting COVID-19, which left him 10 pounds lighter, but then reversed his decision to then play five games for the Gophers. He made national headlines for changing his jersey number from 13 to 0, which he explained represented "zero tolerance for racism," and is pledging to use his future platform in the NFL to continue his advocacy.
"That's just who he is," said his mother, Lashonda Cromer. "I was really worried about him because he was just distraught. All of what happened really hurt him, especially to be there in the middle of it. You always worry about your child, but then I had to worry even more when he started to speak out against it. I didn't want anybody to harm him just because he was speaking out. But he's just that sort of person."
'She was a teacher that cared'
Ten years ago, Mindy Palmer received a surprising private message on Facebook. The account was newly created, she noticed. It was from a young man she had taught in third grade at Tifton's Annie Belle Clark Elementary. He was now in sixth grade and gearing up for his first real season of tackle football.
There was a problem. His mother didn't have the money to buy him cleats. Could she help?
Mindy hadn't forgotten Rashod Bateman. She remembered him as the kid who would get all of his classwork done under one condition: He would be allowed to play football at recess. She knew Lashonda as a low-paid teacher's aide, a job Lashonda chose so that she could be home in the afternoon when Bateman and his two brothers returned from school.
Mindy replied immediately to the Facebook message. The answer, she said recently, was "yes, without hesitation" -- despite the tight finances in her own life. Her husband, Shane, has multiple ongoing health conditions and cannot work, so Mindy has always been their sole provider.
"But I remember thinking, 'Whatever I have, we were willing to do,'" Mindy said. "I just knew from the very beginning that this kid could achieve his dream. There was no way he was not going to, because his work ethic was so strong."
And so began a relationship that extended Bateman's family and support group, and in many ways delivered him to this moment. Mindy and Shane attended his football games, brought him to church, took him out to eat and even invited him on vacation to her family's home on the eastern shore of Maryland. Lashonda deeply appreciated Mindy's efforts, and the two developed a profound friendship.
"She's just a sweet person," Lashonda said. "She was a teacher that cared. You don't find a lot of them anymore."
Said Mindy of Lashonda: "She's my sister, and they're my family."
The Palmers, who are white, have no biological children but became godparents to Rashod. Their mere presence in his life helped drive his burgeoning social awareness while growing up in Tifton, a town of about 17,000 in southern Georgia with a long history of agricultural economics.
In a recent conversation, Mindy recalled the ordeal of bringing Bateman to local restaurants. When they finished eating, the server "would always ask if it would be one check or two," she said. It was a question she viewed as a passive-aggressive comment on the appropriateness of a mixed-race meal. Bateman would ask Mindy blunt questions about the queries, and Mindy says now that she wished she had pushed back on the servers more authoritatively. But she believes that his willingness to push back today spans back to his time in Tifton.
"Racism is so prevalent here," she said. "So I'm just so proud of him for standing up and saying what's right."
Lashonda says she raised all of her children to look past race. As she put it: "We're all the same. We've still got to love one another."
Rashod took it to heart, and Mindy watched as Rashod navigated the confusing terrain of interracial relationships, which includes dating. According to Mindy, a high school girlfriend, who was white, could not tell her father about the relationship.
Bateman said in an interview that he preferred not to delve deeply into his life in Tifton. But Mindy said: "That's why I think going to college in Minnesota really helped. Getting away from here so that he could see some of the things he saw growing up weren't right. Going to school away in a different part of the country, where he could experience and look back and say, 'Hey, I conformed to things that weren't OK.' I wanted him to see that for himself. I wanted him to see things that would tell him, that's not right. It took getting away and getting somewhere else to see that."
The Palmers, and sometimes their extended family, followed Rashod and Lashonda to his college games around the country. Mindy attended all but three games. Her father was there for most of them, along with an assortment of aunts and uncles who would turn up from time to time.
"Mindy and Shane are another piece of our family," Bateman said. "They were there for me and helped out in ways that my mom couldn't."
Mindy was touched recently to learn the story of a photograph she took with Rashod at the end of third grade. Rashod framed it and, Lashonda told her, placed it next to his bed. It stayed there throughout his childhood.
'Everything is so fluid and easy'
As he navigated life as a young Black man, Bateman found clarity on the field. He played extensively as a true freshman and caught 51 passes, including six for touchdowns. By the end of his sophomore season in 2019, during which he caught 60 passes for 1,219 yards and 13 touchdowns, he was already being projected as a potential 2021 first-round pick.
As the draft grows closer, however, it appears Bateman is part of the second tier of a deep receiver class. ESPN's Todd McShay slotted him at No. 37 overall in his most recent mock draft, and Mel Kiper Jr. ranks him as the eighth-best receiver available. In a similarly strong class in 2020, six receivers were selected in the first round.
This assessment might surprise close observers of the Big Ten, where Bateman was one of the most explosive receivers in decades. His 20.3-yard average per reception in 2019 was the third highest in 25 years of conference play among qualified receivers. Along the way, he demonstrated a range of high-end skills, from making circus catches to getting quick releases to turning short slants into long gains.
So why isn't he alongside players such as Alabama's DeVonta Smith and Jaylen Waddle, LSU's Ja'Marr Chase and Terrace Marshall Jr., and Florida's Kadarius Toney in the public discussion of first-round receivers? Bateman attributes such appraisals largely to chronic contempt for, and self-fulfilling evaluations of, Minnesota products.
Indeed, only two Gophers skill players have been drafted in the first round during the common draft era (since 1967): running backs Darrell Thompson in 1990 and Laurence Maroney in 2006. That total ranks No. 51 among Power 5 schools, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. Only one receiver in school history has been drafted higher than the fourth round; Eric Decker was selected in the third round by the Denver Broncos in 2010.
"I just feel like for any athlete at Minnesota, not just as a football player but any sport, we all just feel very disrespected," Bateman said. "I feel that way right now going through this process. I've had a solid career at Minnesota. I was blessed and fortunate enough to do the things that I did, but everybody is going to find something to knock on you. I can't control that. That's for them to judge. But if definitely hurts, just because I feel disrespected and overlooked."
It's possible that Bateman's 2020 season has clouded some evaluations. He initially planned to skip the season entirely, concerned about contracting COVID-19 a second time. Once the Big Ten conference established its health and safety protocols, he reconsidered. Ultimately, Minnesota co-offensive coordinator and receivers coach Matt Simon recalled, Bateman stood in front of the team and said he couldn't imagine watching it play without him.
"I didn't go back to put more film out there," Bateman said. "I didn't go back to impress scouts. Not to be cocky, but I had already impressed scouts. I didn't have to opt back in to do that. I opted back in just because I love Minnesota. I loved this team."
As was the case for many, the 2020 season was far from ideal. For starters, Bateman never regained the weight he lost during his COVID-19 infection, an episode compounded by the remnants of childhood asthma. Lashonda thought he "looked like a high school kid again." (He has gained most of the weight back and is currently at 190 pounds.)
Meanwhile, the Gophers moved him into the slot to replace the Tyler Johnson, who is now with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. After taking 77% of his snaps on the outside in 2019, Bateman took 75% from the slot in 2020. But he still put up three 100-yard games in five outings before opting out a second time as the team encountered a significant outbreak.
The more likely explanation for Bateman's relatively modest draft buzz, based on conversations with personnel evaluators, relates to his speed -- and the frequency with which he uses it during games. Simon couldn't stifle a laugh about that one.
"I can't tell you how much that blows my mind," Simon said. "That people don't think the kid is fast literally blows my mind. You watch him on film, and everything is so fluid and easy for him. He runs so fast without running hard. That should be a tip of the cap to him, but now he's getting knocked for it."
Bateman has done everything in his power to relegate that perception. He ran the 40-yard dash in 4.39 seconds during his pro day earlier this month, certifying several sub-4.4 laser times he produced during the informal EXOS combine in February.
"Whoever it is that doesn't draft me because I'm slow, or whatever it is, that's something they'll have to pay for," Bateman said. "So I just have to keep my head down and keep working."
'I'm going to be involved'
The team that drafts Bateman will get a player who is ready for this moment. NFL players are just beginning to leverage their platform to advance social justice, most notably by pressuring commissioner Roger Goodell last summer to acknowledge the league had erred in "not listening to NFL players earlier and [to] encourage all players to speak out and peacefully protest."
Bateman was among the leaders in that space during the 2020 college football season. He steered team discussions at Minnesota aimed at sharing the Black experience in America. In July, he unveiled a Black Lives Matter tattoo that covers most of his left thigh. As he and the rest of the country await a verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was charged with second-degree murder shortly after Floyd's death, Bateman knows the work is just beginning.
"I plan to use [the NFL platform] to the best of my abilities," he said. "I don't know how. I don't know what that looks like or what I'm going to be doing. But somehow, some way, I'm going to be involved and make this world a better place, to make it more fair and more equal."
My name is Rashod Bateman. I'm an African Male from South Georgia. I never thought in a million years I would be scared to walk outside. I pray that we all wake up and start loving each other the correct way and stop taking each other lives. No matter the color, we are all one. pic.twitter.com/KaW3AWpNJP
— Rashod Bateman (@R_bateman2) May 26, 2020
The lesson of the past year, however, is clear.
"The thing that hurts about it all," he said, "is that we can go out and do all these protests and do all of this stuff, but there are no promises that anything is going to change."
Bateman plans to focus his energies on young adults and children, a time in life not dissimilar to when an unusual but beautiful arrangement impacted him. "His story," Mindy Palmer said, "gives him a voice that people can listen to."