Williamson shared his experience during an Ohio State meeting where players were shown a picture of Trayvon Martin to enforce a “no hoodie rule.”
Marlon Williamson, the father of former Ohio State player Marcus Williamson, defended his son on Twitter on Tuesday after he received backlash for tweeting about his personal experience with the program. The former Buckeyes cornerback tweeted a photo of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old shot and killed in Florida in 2012, and claimed former coach Urban Meyer shared the picture to reinforce his “no hoodie rule.”
Several former Ohio State players including Tyvis Powell, Joshua Perry, Cardale Jones and Evan Spencer took to Twitter after Williamson's thread to defend Meyer and the Buckeyes program so his father decided to chime in.
“Some former OSU football players have expressed that they didn't experience racism at OSU but every athlete doesn't have the same experiences,” he said in the Tweet. “Admittedly, I wasn't in the locker room and didn't attend a ton of practices, but I trust my son and acknowledge the challenges he's faced as a student athlete.”
Meyer said that the team did have a “no hoodie rule” and initially denied using a photo to reinforce the message. Powell later took to Twitter after gaining more information on the incident and was told a photo of Martin was shared during a freshman orientation. The person who shared the photo via a powerpoint presentation later issued an apology after it was pointed out as offensive to him. He did not know the background story of Martin, per Powell.
Meyer initially said the photo was never shared, but was later made aware of the incident by Powell and said he had no knowledge of the situation at the time or thereafter.
“I didn’t know about it until one hour ago, until after talking to [Powell],” Meyer told The Columbus Dispatch on Tuesday. “I wasn’t there [in the meeting]. None of the coaches were present. It was a support staffer who was in error and apologized.”
Meyer was fired in his first season as coach of the Jaguars after several off-the-field incidents including a video of a woman, who was not his wife, dancing on him at at an Ohio bar going viral and a report that he allegedly kicked kicker Josh Lambo during practice.
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