Interested to hear other's take on this, but I think the NFL has a no win situation on their hands.
There's no way a vast number of player's won't be kneeling for the Anthem's this year, and there's no way the NFL can mandate against it, nor can I see them even trying to do so. Other player's who choose to stand for the Anthem may now be at risk of being labelled racist for not kneeling, and so they'll either be chastised for standing, or feel obligated to kneel as well.
That said, it's inevitable that a large percentage of fans will take offense to either the kneeling of the player's, or offense at the player's who choose to stand, and could potentially just tune out the league like they did a couple years ago. The league also risks losing a good amount of fans by choosing to not do the Anthem at all.
Aside from that, I can see a lot of internal tension amongst teammates that either stand or kneel as well, with players that kneel feeling disrespected by their other teammates who may choose not to kneel. They may feel like they don't have their back or aren't taking the issue seriously enough along with them.
If stadiums are half full, or less due to COVID, and the league loses a noticeable amount of TV viewers over this Anthem issue as well, the league could be hurting sooner than later.
Watching how Drew Brees' comments have blown up the league over the past few days, I think this is going to be a major issue moving forward.
What's your take?
There's no way a vast number of player's won't be kneeling for the Anthem's this year, and there's no way the NFL can mandate against it, nor can I see them even trying to do so. Other player's who choose to stand for the Anthem may now be at risk of being labelled racist for not kneeling, and so they'll either be chastised for standing, or feel obligated to kneel as well.
That said, it's inevitable that a large percentage of fans will take offense to either the kneeling of the player's, or offense at the player's who choose to stand, and could potentially just tune out the league like they did a couple years ago. The league also risks losing a good amount of fans by choosing to not do the Anthem at all.
Aside from that, I can see a lot of internal tension amongst teammates that either stand or kneel as well, with players that kneel feeling disrespected by their other teammates who may choose not to kneel. They may feel like they don't have their back or aren't taking the issue seriously enough along with them.
If stadiums are half full, or less due to COVID, and the league loses a noticeable amount of TV viewers over this Anthem issue as well, the league could be hurting sooner than later.
Watching how Drew Brees' comments have blown up the league over the past few days, I think this is going to be a major issue moving forward.
What's your take?