“If Kap Played Today, He’d Outshine Mahomes and Burrow, Says Former NFL Star!”

Oh, buckle up, football world, because former Steelers safety Ryan Clark just detonated the kind of hot take that makes Skip Bayless look like a whispering monk.

According to Clark, Colin Kaepernick wouldn’t just be in the NFL if things had gone differently — he’d be the guy, the face of the entire league in 2025.

Forget Patrick Mahomes with his ketchup obsession.

Forget Joe Burrow with his cigars and ice-cold arrogance.

Forget Lamar Jackson doing Lamar Jackson things.

Clark says Kaepernick would have been sitting at the throne, golden crown and all, as the NFL’s most talked-about player.

And honestly, the internet hasn’t seen this level of meltdown since Taylor Swift showed up in a Chiefs luxury box.

Clark didn’t sugarcoat it, either.

He said point-blank that if Kap were still in the NFL, he’d be the biggest name in the sport — combining elite athletic talent with a cultural presence that no quarterback in today’s game can touch.

Yes, that means the league’s golden boys would all be playing sidekick to the guy who hasn’t taken a snap since 2016.

Eight years on the shelf? Doesn’t matter.

Clark insists the mix of electric play and off-field activism would have made him untouchable in fame.

One fan on Twitter summed it up in a post that’s already been memed to death: “Imagine kneeling in 2016 and waking up in 2025 as the GOAT of both football and woke Twitter. ”

Of course, not everyone’s clapping their hands.

NFL traditionalists, the kind who still wear Brett Favre Wrangler jeans to the grocery store, are foaming at the mouth.

“How dare he disrespect Mahomes like that,” one furious fan wrote, adding seventeen American flag emojis for emphasis.

Another guy, presumably typing from his basement shrine to Tom Brady, declared, “Kaepernick would’ve been out of the league in three years anyway.

He was average.

Average! Stop the revisionist history. ”

Meanwhile, Clark has refused to back down.

In fact, insiders claim he doubled down in private, allegedly saying, “Kaepernick would’ve sold more jerseys than LeBron James and Harry Styles combined. ”

Okay, that one might be satire — but at this point, it’s hard to tell.

Let’s not forget, Kaepernick’s story is one of the wildest “what ifs” in modern sports.

He had the 49ers one play away from a Super Bowl win in 2013.

He ran like a gazelle and threw like a cannon.

He made defenses look like they were stuck in slow-motion.

And then 2016 hit.

Instead of fading into mediocrity, Kap became a cultural lightning rod, kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial injustice and police brutality.

Cue the outrage machine.

Cue the think pieces.

Cue the endless debate shows with Stephen A. Smith sweating profusely about “the shield. ”

And then — radio silence.

No NFL team touched him.

No backup job.

No second chance.

The guy who had outplayed Aaron Rodgers in Lambeau suddenly couldn’t even get a tryout.

Officially, he wasn’t banned.

Unofficially? Blacklist city.

Fast forward to now, and Clark is basically saying, “Yeah, you all blew it. ”

Imagine the 2025 NFL if Kap were still playing.

Would he be Mahomes-level good? Maybe not.

But would he be Mahomes-level talked about? Absolutely.

Kap’s jersey would outsell whatever ugly “throwback” uniform Nike just vomited out this week.

Every press conference would trend.

Every touchdown celebration would be a political statement.

Every primetime game would be both a highlight reel and a sociology lecture.

As one fake “celebrity brand expert” told us (while sipping a pumpkin spice latte): “Kaepernick wouldn’t just be the face of football.

He’d be the face of culture.

He’d make the NFL cool again.

And he’d probably get his own fragrance deal — Eau de Resistance. ”

And don’t think today’s NFL stars wouldn’t feel the ripple effects.

Patrick Mahomes might still have his three Super Bowls, but suddenly he’s Robin instead of Batman.

Joe Burrow’s icy “Joe Cool” aesthetic? Overshadowed.

Jalen Hurts’ fashion shoots? Forgotten.

Even Aaron Rodgers’ darkness retreat stories would feel like footnotes compared to Kap giving postgame interviews about systemic injustice.

The NFL wouldn’t just be about touchdowns anymore — it’d be about movements, hashtags, and the perpetual fury of certain talk radio hosts who would lose their voices screaming about “politics in sports. ”

Naturally, the takes are flying.

Some fans think Clark’s statement is a much-needed reminder that Kap was a force of nature both on and off the field.

Others think it’s revisionist hype, like calling Tim Tebow “the greatest tight end who never was. ”

But the truth is probably somewhere in between.

Kap wasn’t washed when he left — he was better than half the starting QBs in the league at the time.

And while we’ll never know if he would’ve evolved into a Mahomes-level superstar, we do know this: he changed the conversation around football forever.

You can’t say that about Kirk Cousins, can you?

So here we are, almost a decade later, still arguing about a quarterback who hasn’t played a down since Obama was president.

And that’s exactly Clark’s point.

Kaepernick’s cultural power hasn’t faded — if anything, it’s grown.

Which raises the real question: if he never got blacklisted, would the NFL have been ready for a player who could dominate on the field and shake the very foundations of its image off the field? Or would Goodell have broken into a cold sweat every Sunday night?

Either way, Ryan Clark just reignited the Kaepernick debate for the millionth time.

And judging by the chaos online, people will never stop arguing about it.

One thing’s for sure: in 2025, Kap is still the NFL’s most polarizing ghost.

And maybe Clark is right — maybe if things had gone differently, we’d be living in a football world where Colin Kaepernick isn’t just part of the conversation.

He is the conversation.