Things escalated quickly from some bullshit comments the president made recently, this time it has to do with sports.
It’s all Twitter’s been talking about for days, so let’s recap this.
There are 14 NFL games on today, most of which start at 1PM EST. Already, in the first game of the day, many players from both the Ravens and Jaguars have kneeled. President and CEO Mark Murphy of the Packers (who are playing today at 4:25) says all players should be allowed to express themselves. Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin has told CBS that the whole team will sit in the locker room for the anthem.
NBA players have also been protesting Trump after he rescinded the NBA champion Golden State Warriors’ White House invitation, apparently because of criticism from Steph Curry (like he cared). The NCAA champion team Tar Heels is also refusing to attend (reportedly because of scheduling issues).
Yesterday Bruce Maxwell, catcher for the Oakland Athletics, became the first MLB player to take a knee.
Even Stevie Wonder took a knee Saturday night at a music festival in New York, TMZ reports.
We’ll see what happens this afternoon.
Update 2:19PM EST: It’s gametime. Many players on the Broncos, the Detroit Lions, the Patriots, the Saints, the Cleveland Browns, four on the Dolphins, and two on the Buccaneers took the knee. National anthem singer Rico Lavelle reportedly took the knee and raised his fist at the Falcons-Lions game. One Steelers player came out of the locker room for the anthem.
Update 4:53PM EST: CNN reports that, as a direct response to Donald Trump’s rants, the NFL will re-run its Super Bowl ad on unity this evening on NBC during primetime.
