One player knelt during the three national anthems yesterday, with Giants defensive end Olivier Vernon continuing his protest of racial inequality and police brutality.
But that was enough to get President Donald Trump’s attention before a round of golf with Tiger Woods and Dustin Johnson.
The President continued this morning his Twitter assault on the club which refused him admission (even though he shares the NFL’s penchant for excessive capitalization of proper nouns). Responding to a tweet by social media director Don Scavino which noted Vernon kneeling, Trump continued to take shots at the league.
“Can you believe that the disrespect for our Country, our Flag, our Anthem continues without penalty to the players. The Commissioner has lost control of the hemorrhaging league. Players are the boss!”
While some Lions players have knelt or raised fists during the anthem in the past, there was no report of that yesterday prior to their game with the Vikings.
All players on both sides of the field stood during the anthem during the Chargers-Cowboys game, though Chargers left tackle Russell Okung and Cowboys defensive end David Irving raised their fists, according to the Dallas Morning News.
Other than Vernon, there was no reports of other player protests last night in the Washington-Giants game.
Vernon told Newsday’s Bob Glauber last week that he still wants people to understand his message has nothing to do with the military.
“What it would take for me to stand is if people can understand what the whole message is behind it,” Vernon said. “That would actually help a whole lot, but everybody doesn’t see things that way and tries to distort what the message was from the beginning, which is basically social injustice on African-Americans and police brutality.”
But even though that’s been explained a number of times, some are struggling with the message, and are using the image to rally their base before getting back to the business of the country, or something.