Every player on the Pittsburgh Steelers except one stayed in the locker room during the National Anthem for Sunday afternoon’s game against the Chicago Bears, an apparent pushback against President Donald Trump’s statements over the weekend attacking the NFL. That player stood near the entrance to the field.
Several players from the Jaguars and Ravens decided to kneel in the first NFL game of the day in London. Then Tomlin said his players would not be on the sideline at Soldier Field in Chicago for the anthem.
Former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagilabue called President Donald Trump’s comments on NFL players “insulting and disgraceful.”
Tagliabue, who was in Charlotte, North Carolina, as a guest of Panthers owner Jerry Richardson, spoke to the media before Carolina’s game against the New Orleans Saints.
“For me to single out any particular group of players and call them SOB’s, to me, that is insulting and disgraceful,” Tagliabue said. “So I think the players deserve credit for what they do. And when it comes to speech they are entitled to speak. And we are entitled to listen. We are entitled to agree or disagree. But we’re not entitled to shut anybody’s speech down. Sometimes you don’t like what you hear and that is true in life in lots of contexts, but you can’t shut people down and be disgraceful when you are doing it.”
Alejandro Villanueva was the lone Steelers player to come out during the national anthem pic.twitter.com/Jl7id3EGnk
— SB Nation (@SBNation) September 24, 2017
NFL Players Kneel, Sit & Link Arms During National Anthem pic.twitter.com/BJYBb1Luri
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) September 24, 2017
A handful of Miami Dolphins players are wearing black T-shirts supporting free agent quarterback Colin Kaepernick during pregame warm-ups.
The shirts have “#IMWITHKAP” written in bold white lettering on the front.
Kaepernick was the first athlete to refuse to stand during the national anthem as a protest. This season, no team has signed him, and some supporters believe NFL owners are avoiding him because of the controversy.
(AP)
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8 Responses
What a בזיון to USA. If trump can get is 23 million followers to boycot the game, they will come back crawling for forgiveness.
go Alejandro Villanueva!
NO!!! Former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagilabue’s response is disgraceful. If the super-spoiled, overpaid self-styled nobodies have no respect for this country, let them go and live in Iran or North Korea and try to protest there. This is not about black rights, it is all about following “the program”. Fortunately, no one has hired Kaepernick. Let that be a lesson to him as well as to his fellow protestors.
There is already are indications that the unpatriotic behavior of the players is alienating large number of NFL fans which is expressing itself in lower attendance and “ratings” for broadcast games. If the teams end up losing profits as a result, they will be less inclined to overpay the players.
In some other countries these ingrates wouldn’t even be allowed to watch a game let alone play in one.
It’s a disgrace that these self-styled hooligans set political policy.
Let them just run with the darn ball and bash the heck out of each other and leave intellectual matters to those who possess those abilities.
These people are stupid brainwashed disgraceful ingrates, and as such they should be treated. That noone from the NFL came out in support of our star spangled banner us a indictment on them all. #boycottNFL
Which one of the “gentlemen” in the above photo would you choose as Secretary of State? Which as Defense Secretary?
Why is this on YWN? Mai ka’mashma lan these people?