NBC has come under fire for omitting Houston Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud’s praise of Jesus Christ during a postgame interview.
Following the Texans’ victory over the Cleveland Browns on Saturday, Stroud told NBC’s Kathryn Tappen: “First and foremost, I just want to give all glory to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,” before talking about the city of Houston and fans’ support of him.
The version posted by NBC, however, began after the religious remark, chopping the mention of Jesus.
Both versions were posted by MLFootball on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“It seems like being religious and praying to a god is no longer allowed,” MLFootball remarked.
Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., vented his outrage on X, calling the cut “despicable and un-American.”
“Leave it to @NBCNews to edit out C.J. Stroud’s mention of Jesus Christ,” he wrote on X.
“The left’s attack on Christianity & its followers is despicable & un-American. People like @TonyDungy & C.J. are men of profound faith & appreciation of God that should be celebrated, not censored.”
Dungy is a former football player and coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Indianapolis Colts.
“It’s disconcerting to realize NBC is actively censoring a player praising Jesus after a massive win,” the outlet posted. “Would NBC have censored his speech if he praised transgenders or Palestinians?”
Stroud has been open about his faith in the past, Fox Sports has reported.
For example, in November, amid MVP conversations, Stroud turned his attention to God.
“For me, it’s a lot of prayer,” Stroud explained, Fox Sports reported. “A lot of knowing that God wouldn’t put anything on me that I can’t handle. I don’t deserve his grace and his mercy, but he still gives it to me and I love him for that. It’s not about me, it’s about him and his glory. So I think that’s where it comes from. I think God made me like that.”
And in February 2023, he remarked about his faith: “It’s what’s kept me grounded even through my season,” Fox reported at the time. “Football has a lot of ups and downs, it has a lot of twists and turns, but at the end of the day, it’s all about your foundation. And something that’s set my foundation is my faith.”
Former Detroit Lions running back Barry Sanders’ career has largely been defined by his record-setting performances on the football field. Whether it was breaking tackles or rushing in touchdowns under seemingly impossible circumstances, Sanders has arguably solidified himself as the greatest running back in NFL history never to win a Super Bowl.
But what may surprise people is that buried beneath the media headlines and glamorous titles is a man who loved the game far more than the celebrity that came with it.
In Prime Video’s “Bye Bye Barry,” viewers are shown a humble Sanders whose excitement for football is generated not by setting personal records or winning individual awards but by playing to the best of his ability for his teammates. During the last game of his high school career, for example, Sanders was less than 100 yards shy of the state rushing title and was offered the chance to keep playing to break it. With his team leading by a comfortable margin, Sanders declined and instead allowed the team’s younger members to get playing time.
Sanders would carry this level of humility with him into his respective careers at Oklahoma State (1986-1988) and Detroit (1989-1998). Following a historic 1988 college season, the Kansas native was designated as a finalist for — and ultimately won — the Heisman Trophy, the accolade given to college football’s most outstanding player. While Sanders was grateful for the recognition, those closest to him noted how he “didn’t want” the award because he “never really cared about accolades.”
When he became the third professional player to rush for more than 2,000 yards in a single season in 1997, he continued to play the game with the same “business as usual” mentality he’d always played with. Instead of celebrating after running a big play or scoring a touchdown, he’d just hand the ball off to the referee and jog back to his team, ready for the next play.
For Sanders, the game was never about him. It was about the team and finding ways he could help bring them to victory. Everything else — fame, awards, media coverage — was irrelevant, so his decision to announce his retirement from the NFL via fax isn’t all that surprising.
Contrast such humility with the behavior displayed by many of today’s professional athletes. Whether it’s making a first down or scoring a touchdown, the average, modern-day NFL player gets up and immediately starts dancing or engaging in some bizarre celebration — even if his team is losing. All that matters is being commended for what he — not the team — accomplished.
And sure, sometimes players engage in team celebrations in the endzone after scoring a touchdown — but they’re no less childish than if a single player did them.
It’s perfectly fine for players to experience joy while playing a sport they love. In fact, we should encourage more of that. But when that happiness transforms into clownish behavior and self-centeredness, the respectability of the game suffers. After all, there isn’t an “I” in “team.”
“Bye Bye Barry” does a terrific job at showcasing Sanders’ legendary career and providing an in-depth look at the man inside the helmet. But above all, it documents a bygone era in which modesty and humility were prioritized over the narcissistic individualism that frequents today’s professional sports.
Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He previously served as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
After a routine tackle during Monday night’s Bills-Bengals game, Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed on his back in cardiac arrest. Medical personnel administered CPR for roughly 10 minutes before an ambulance carted Hamlin off the field and to a Cincinnati hospital.
While it drove off, onlookers reported seeing Bills head coach Sean McDermott gather his players on the field for communal prayer. As both teams and staff knelt around Hamlin during those 10 minutes of CPR, individual players certainly were praying too. One Bengals fan at the game scribbled “Pray for Buffalo #3 Hamlin” on a paper sign. Minutes later, fans of both teams showed up at Hamlin’s hospital to pray. Players from around the league, fans, and others across social media offered prayers. We join them all in their prayers for his body and soul.
To watch the heart of the man beside you on the field stop beating, as Hamlin’s teammates and competitors did, is to be reminded of the Maker-meeting moment every one of us will encounter. Those reminders compel us to pray for mercy. Only the players and God know the content of the prayers offered from the field in Paycor Stadium last night, but I’d guess they prayed for the mercies of healing, comfort, and more time on this Earth, either to serve God or to encounter his grace.
For followers of Christ, prayer is a familiar weapon. It is a means by which we may approach the holy God and make our requests known to him. It is an act of intimacy and communion with our Maker and Judge, and a channel by which we offer humble repentance and receive unmerited grace. When faced with the threat of tragedy — a symptom of living in a world tainted by our own sin — we quickly remember our constant need for mercy, and it compels us to pray.
In moments like last night, however, it seems it’s not only the adopted children of God who cry out to him. Something prompts even those who, in another moment, might doubt the existence of God, to suddenly seek his mercy. Skeptics love to mock the offering of “thoughts and prayers” as useless or silly, but their quickness to turn to prayer in times of need suggests that deep down, they know its power.
Why? Our souls are created for eternity. Whether we admit it or not, moments that force us to wrestle with our own mortality are less about facing death and more about facing the reality that we are part of a judgment and redemption narrative far beyond the scope of our brief earthly pilgrimage, and which extends far beyond that pilgrimage’s end.
To repentantly welcome that redemption, recognizing our utter need for it and Christ’s exclusive worthiness to procure it, inspires worshipful gratitude. To reject it, or to indifferently ignore it, is to choose a life in which the existence of death rightly inspires fear. As we pray for Damar Hamlin’s recovery, we also pray that his brush with eternity would stir onlookers to grasp their own need for the loving mercy of God.
A few weeks ago, Hamlin spoke on “One Bills Live” about a sobering injury his teammate Dane Jackson had received.
“I can’t even describe it, but I cherish it every second that I can. Every second of every day,” Hamlin said. “We just had our prayer, our DB prayer we do every Wednesday. He was next to me and I just grabbed his hand a little bit harder just because you know, you never know when your last day could be that you get to experience something like this.”
That’s a realization that, for untold observers, Hamlin’s own scare just prompted. In addition to recalling our need for salvation, such reminders of eternity should spur us to pray more diligently and to live more gratefully. Alongside our petitions for Hamlin’s comfort and healing, we pray God would use the events of last night to compel more gratitude, prayerful vigilance, humble repentance, and joyful reception of grace, in Hamlin’s heart and in our own.
Elle Purnell is an assistant editor at The Federalist, and received her B.A. in government from Patrick Henry College with a minor in journalism. Follow her work on Twitter @_etreynolds.
Pascal Le Segretain / Staff, Bob Levey / Contributor | Getty Images
We used to understand that not everything is for everybody. We no longer do. We live in the era of unisex bathrooms. In the name of “inclusion,” we killed the Boy Scouts to make room for girls. We expanded marriage. We bought the lie that everything is for everybody. We embraced the myth that we can have it all. No, we can’t. Our collective pursuit of everything undergirds America’s decline.
Pat Riley, the NBA legend, calls it the “disease of more.” A team wins a championship, and every member of the organization wants more for themselves. The quest for more eventually changes the character of the pursuer. He or she loses life balance and compromises core values in the hunt for more.
In my opinion, the “disease of more” explains Tom Brady’s rumored divorce. You can’t have it all.
It’s a lesson that the NFL will soon learn. The National Football League, America’s favorite form of entertainment, wants to have it all. Under the weak leadership of commissioner Roger Goodell, the NFL has spent the last 15 years pursuing corporate media-defined inclusion.
A sport intended to groom young boys and men to compete in a meritocracy has bowed to the feminist worldview of diversity, inclusion, and equity. The NFL strives to be everything for everybody. The push for inclusion has caused the league to prioritize safety.
Safety is a woman’s priority. Men seek thrills and danger. Men aren’t sadistic. We’re made different by design. Our love of danger leads to progress and advancement. Men called “roughnecks” built skyscrapers in the 1920s. Forty percent of them fell to their deaths or disablement. Women never would have done it.
The NFL’s preference to maximize safety and limit danger poses the greatest threat to America’s most popular sport. It’s a far more damaging initiative than the league’s promotion of Black Lives Matter and anti-American sentiment.
People watch football because we’re entertained by seeing men flirt with danger in pursuit of a goal.
Football is far less entertaining than it was 20 years ago, before an onslaught of rules changes softened the game and demonized hard hits. Yesterday’s Atlanta-Tampa Bay game was ruined when referee Jerome Boger flagged a Falcons defensive lineman for a routine sack of Tom Brady. The roughing-the-passer penalty cost Atlanta any chance of a comeback.
On Miami’s first offensive play against the New York Jets, officials monitoring the game removed quarterback Teddy Bridgewater because he allegedly briefly staggered when getting to his feet after a routine hit. Bridgewater was not allowed to return to the game. Facing Miami’s third-string quarterback, the Jets won in a romp.
The Brady and Bridgewater plays are a direct result of the Tua Tagovailoa controversy two weeks ago. Tagovailoa, who is fragile, suffered brief paralysis after a routine hit. Without a shred of evidence, broadcasters and social media influencers connected Tagovailoa’s brief paralysis to a hit he suffered four days earlier.
Broadcasters demonized the Dolphins organization and the team’s head coach for allowing Tua to play. The NFLPA demanded an investigation and then worked with the NFL to enact immediate new rules related to concussion protocols. Those new rules are why Bridgewater disappeared yesterday after one play.
We all want football to be safe. When it’s not safe, we want to blame somebody.
The game isn’t meant to be safe. It’s meant to be dangerous and entertaining. People are going to get hurt. It’s inevitable. It’s no different from boxing or mixed martial arts. It’s no different from working on a skyscraper in the 1920s.
The NFL won’t make this argument because the league wants to be all things to all people. It wants to avoid upsetting women and men who have been feminized to the point that they might as well be women.
The NFL fears moms. Women who won’t let their sons play football because the sport is too dangerous. They’re the same women who won’t let their kids go to school without wearing a mask. They’re women who want to remove all the risks from life. Women and beta males desire for all of us to sit in our homes playing video games, communicating over social media, watching 50-year-old Queen Latifah beat up men in “The Equalizer” TV series, and waiting for our next booster shot. They want us all to transition into women. Their plan is working.
I’ve watched football for 50 years. I turned off my television when I saw Tua’s momentarily disfigured fingers locked in the air. I briefly lost my appetite for football. That has never happened before. It speaks to the impact of football concussion propaganda. I’ll watch someone get knocked out in the ring or octagon and jump for joy.
But we have been programmed to see violence in football as savage and gruesome. Fifteen years ago, Chris Berman and Tom Jackson could react to NFL big hits the way Joe Rogan and Daniel Cormier still do at UFC events. We’re all still allowed to enjoy seeing fighters get put in the concussion protocol. It’s socially unacceptable to enjoy it on the football field. We pretend that the grossly exaggerated CTE pandemic only affects football players. We’ve been feminized. We’ve been programmed to prioritize our emotions and feelings over logic and fact.
We no longer know when, how, and where we should feed and support man’s innate desire to take risks. We’ve been convinced swiping left and right on Tinder is a better venue for risk-taking than a football field. More kids will be permanently and severely damaged in a hospital operating room undergoing gender-affirming surgery than playing football.
You get my point? The very people trying to make the world safer are actually making it more dangerous.
Football isn’t for women. Trying to make the game more palatable to women is a mistake. It’s why Arizona quarterback Kyler Murray showed up to work on Sunday wearing a lime green Hillary Clinton pantsuit. Among other things, feminized football turns men into runway models.
A.F. Branco has taken his two greatest passions, (art and politics) and translated them into the cartoons that have been seen all over the country, in various news outlets including “Fox News” and “The Washington Post.” He has been recognized by such personalities as James Woods, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, and even the great El Rushbo.
Maybe President Trump will un-cancel his meeting with the Philadelphia Eagles, like he did his meeting with the Pyongyang Tyrant. It all had something to do with taking a knee during the National Anthem. Even though no Eagles took a knee. Eagles Rodman Rocket Man Anyway, it turns out Kim’s best buddy, Denis Rodman, likes<!– AddThis Advanced Settings above via filter on wp_trim_excerpt –><!– AddThis Advanced Settings below via filter on wp_trim_excerpt –><!– AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt –><!– AddThis Share Buttons above via filter on wp_trim_excerpt –><!– AddThis Share Buttons below via filter on wp_trim_excerpt –>
Maybe President Trump will un-cancel his meeting with the Philadelphia Eagles, like he did his meeting with the Pyongyang Tyrant. It all had something to do with taking a knee during the National Anthem. Even though no Eagles took a knee.
Two New Jersey high school football officials walked off the field Friday night after players knelt during the national anthem. Ernie Lunardelli, 54, and his son, Anthony, 27, stood for the anthem and left the field after seeing players on Monroe High School football team kneeling prior to a Sept. 28 game at New Brunswick, NJ.com reported.
The officials’ spots were filled by junior cadet officials at the game, Ernie Lunardelli told NJ.com.
“I’m not in favor of anyone disrespecting our country, our flag, the armed forces,” he said.
“What they’re protesting has nothing to do with the national anthem and I’m against it, so I decided to protest for them kneeling and that’s what I did,” the veteran football official said.
“Whoever is disrespecting that flag and the national anthem, that’s who I have a problem with.
“That’s my protest. I don’t care if it’s a baby, if it’s an 80-year-old man, anybody. I don’t care. Any race, color, I don’t care who it is. It’s not the way I was brought up and it pisses me off that people are doing that,” he added.
“What hurts the most is these kids don’t even know why they’re kneeling. I just don’t understand why this is happening, especially at the high school level. If you’re not happy with being in America, go somewhere else. It’s that simple.”
Amen.
Anthony Lunardelli, who graduated from Monroe in 2008, said he thought kneeling during the anthem was disrespectful.
“They’ve got a right to protest and so do we,” he told MyCentralNewJersey.com. “That (taking a knee during the anthem) is not how I was brought up, and that’s not how I was raised. I’m not criticizing their right. That’s just my viewpoint.”
New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association assistant director Jack DuBois told NJ.com that the situation was unheard of.
“I’ve been involved in high school athletics for 48 years and I’ve never seen or heard of an official leaving a game in any sport,”DuBois said.
“I don’t think it would be appropriate to comment about what transpired without knowing exactly what happened and why. I can tell you this will be investigated by both the Central Jersey chapter and our office.”
Ernie Lunardelli, who is in his 18th season of officiating games, told NJ.com he expected to be ostracized because of his actions.
“I have a lawyer already set up because they’re not going to run me out of town,” Ernie said. “They’re going to try to blackball me. I know what’s going to happen.”
Let’s hope that doesn’t happen. After all, if the students have a right to emulate professionals, officials should have the right to protest it.
It’s not quite the No Fan League yet, but on Sunday, NFL stadiums illustrated the damage that has been done by the seemingly endless national anthem protests, which have driven away thousands of football fans.
Dylan Gwinn, writing on Breitbart, called it the “’new normal’in the age of anthem protests: empty seats.”
Multiple games were played with clearly visible holes in the stands.
In Jacksonville, Florida, the smallest crowd since 2009 watched the Jaguars lose to the LA Rams 27-17, according to the Florida Times-Union. The crowd of 56,232 was about 5,000 fewer fans than the audience that attended the team’s home opener.
“Granted, this is Jacksonville and they’ve never really packed the house. Yet, even by Jaguars standards, that’s empty,”Gwinn wrote.
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The Jaguars weren’t the only team to suffer this fate. As can be seen below, many other stadiums experienced a visible drop in attendance.
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“The fact that those same levels of emptiness can be seen at other stadiums throughout the league, means that the fan backlash against the NFL has now turned everyone into Jacksonville. That’s a problem,”Gwinn wrote.
Not so, said Jacksonville defensive tackle Malik Jackson.
“We only worry about the people who come support us,”he said. “If you don’t want to come support us because of the views we have off the field, that’s your problem and I think you have to look at yourself.”
The lackluster attendance has added to the NFL’s concerns as it approaches a lease meeting at which the protests will be discussed. However, the league has already indicated it is not likely to require players to stand, as demanded by President Donald Trump.
CBS Sports quoted a source predicting how the meetings might go.
“Basically, the message from the NFL is going to be that it has empathy for its players and the situation they now find themselves in,” the source said. “And therefore you’ve seen no enforcement of the rule about the anthem in the gameday manual. But now this has morphed into something that is seen as divisive and disrespectful toward the flag and our servicemen and women by a segment of the country, and that’s not what was intended by the players or the NFL.
“So the league is going to encourage the players to follow the gameday manual and vow to continue to engage directly with players and the NFLPA on a platform to work for positive change in their communities. It’s not going to be – ‘If you don’t stand then you are going to get fined.’ Some owners might favor that, but that’s not the intention here,” the source added.
As the voices of football fans and patriotic Americans continue to swell in opposition to protests taking place before NFL games, even athletes who endeared themselves to the fans are feeling the sting. Retired Baltimore Ravens star linebacker Ray Lewis is an example.
Lewis made the Pro Bowl in 13 of his 17 seasons, was named Super Bowl MVP, and had a statue erected in his honor outside the Ravens’ M&T Bank Stadium.
Then came Sunday, when Lewis dropped to his knees during the singing of the national anthem at Baltimore’s game against the Jacksonville Jaguars in London — and now a petition calling for the removal of his statue has collected over 50,000 signatures.
By Friday, a change.org petition for the removal of the statue had almost 69,000 signatures.
Officials are not taking the fans’ passion as lightly as are the NFL’s players.
“There is additional security at the statue plaza at this time,” said Rachelina Bonacci, a spokesperson for the Maryland Stadium Authority.
“Certainly observers can notice the presence of uniformed security officers at M&T Bank Stadium, which includes the statue plaza,” she said. “The additional officers and other security enhancements have been in place since Sunday afternoon.”
The petition reads, “I want the Ray Lewis statue at Ravens Stadium removed because of his refusal to stand during the national anthem. That song honors our country and our veterans who fought for it. To kneel during it is disrespectful, regardless of what you are protesting. I will not stand for that kind of disrespect towards our country, especially from a legend such as Ray Lewis. You stand for the National Anthem as a salute to those who can’t stand because they fought for this land.”
The petition was accompanied by a soul-searching letter from Eric Moniodis, who started the petition, to Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti.
“I sit here heartbroken, searching for answers, and questioning why it has come to this. I am disappointed, to say the least. The team that I have loved since 1996, and the Raven I came to respect more than any other, has defiled my National Anthem, my country, and all of it’s (sic) troops,” he wrote.
Moniodis said Lewis was once a legend, but is so no longer.
“A legend is a hero both on and off the field, and by disgracing this great country by kneeling during the national anthem, on foreign soil no less, he has lost the respect of myself and many of my peers who used to see him in a different light,” he wrote.
Moniodis called refusing to stand for the anthem “blatant disrespect to our country’s solute to our troops, veterans and first responders.”
Lewis spoke about the petition during a local sports radio show.
“It only bothers me if I blatantly did something to gain awareness for myself. What I did — is for our country. That’s why I challenge people,”he said.
Lewis said there was significance in the fact the he knelt on both knees, and not only one. “You can protest, I’m gonna pray,” he said.
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At an Alabama rally Friday night, President Donald J. Trump argued that NFL owners should release any team member who “disrespects our flag.” Apparently, America agrees.
Since the president called on team owners to take action — and those same owners, along with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, essentially thumbed their collective nose at him — ticket sales have plummeted.
Online ticket re-seller TickPick told Paul Bedard at the Washington Examiner that NFL sales for Week Four games dropped nearly 18 percentsince prior to Trump’s statement.
According to the Examiner, TickPick cited two numbers damning to the NFL’s response to Trump and the recent national anthem controversy:
17.9 percent decrease in NFL orders this week compared to the previous week.
Last year the drop was 10.8 percent in orders on Monday & Tuesday following Week Three games.
Bedard referred to the sharp decline as the “Trump Effect.”
Trump said at the Alabama rally that he would “love to see”players fired who participated in protests, such as kneeling, during the pre-game playing of the national anthem, according to NPR.
“‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now, out, he’s fired,”Trump said he’d like to hear NFL owners say. “‘He’s fired.’”
After those statements, many, many more NFL players — some joined by coaches and other staff members — publicly took a knee during the national anthem, bringing even more attention to the controversy and apparently angering many fans.
Nonetheless, Goodell didn’t appear ready to back down.
“The way we reacted today, and this weekend, made me proud,” Goodell said Sunday of the NFL’s response to Trump’s statement, which he called “divisive,” according to Sport Illustrated. “I’m proud of our league.”
“We have seen a massive decrease in NFL ticket purchases this past week in comparison to years past,”TickPick’s Jack Slingland told the Examiner. “Week 3 seems to usually have less ticket orders than week 2, but this year ticket purchases are down more than 7 percent from this time last year.”
“While we can’t specify if this decrease is due to the president’s comments, player and owner protests, play on the field, or simply the continued division of consumer’s media attention, the conversation around the NFL this week has focused on the president’s comments as well as the players’ and owners’ reaction,”Slingland said.
“As viewers continue to abandon their NFL Sunday habits, both the number of ticket sales and the purchase price of tickets will drop,”he predicted.
In response to the epidemic of national anthem protests sweeping the National Football League, NFL legend John Elway has made two things clear.
First, he will always stand for the national anthem even if others exercise their right to protest. Second, it is long past time to get politics out of football games.
Elway, who starred with the Denver Broncos as a player and is now the team’s general manager, made it clear this week that while not condemning players who kneel, he would never join them.
“I’m one that believes in standing for the national anthem, and I’ve always believed that. I believe that this is the greatest country in the world. We are very fortunate to live here, but it’s obviously not perfect,”he said.
“There are a lot of things that need to be corrected, and we will continue to work on those things. I’m one that really believes in standing for the flag,”Elway said.
Elway indicated that he believed comments from President Donald Trump, who strongly criticized protesting NFL players, were a major factor in the protests that took place last weekend.
“I understand the players and the way they felt from the comments that were made earlier in the week. They felt they had to go down and kneel and that’s up to them,”he said.
But enough is enough, Elway also said.
“Hopefully, as we go forward we can start concentrating on football a little bit more. Take the politics out of football. But I think that last week was a good show of unity by the NFL and hopefully this week we can move forward,”he said.
Elway’s remarks mirrored those of Broncos head coach Vance Joseph, who said his players have the right to protest, even if he believes in standing for the anthem. Jones also seemed to finger Trump for the latest round of protests.
“That’s their right as U.S. citizens. The comments didn’t sit well with our football team or the entire NFL,”Joseph said. “Hopefully, we can move past this and play football because politics and football don’t mix, in my opinion. I’m a football coach and they’re football players, and our job is to win football games. Hopefully, we can get back to that this week.”
Elway had been asked about protests in August, and responded with a clear focus on job one — winning football games.
“My stance is that everybody has their right to do what they wish to do and their beliefs are their beliefs. That’s why we live in this country. They have the right to display whatever they wish to display,”he said then.
“I think one thing — where we stand and where I stand with the Broncos — is, ‘That’s OK and we will respect that and whatever you want to do is fine with us. But the bottom line is that can’t get in the way with our main goal. And that is to compete for world championships,’” he said.
“I just don’t want that pulling away from our team. It can pull (you) away, because it does get a lot of attention. The only thing that I would say to our players is to make sure it’s not hurting your teammate. If the questions and everything — if the tenor changes of what goes on in these interviews and you’re not talking about our next opponent, you’re talking about what’s going on in the world — that’s not the best thing for our football team,”Elway said then.
The debate over NFL players kneeling in protest of the national anthem, a protest started by former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick last year, grew thick over the weekend when President Donald Trump waded into the middle of it.
Proponents of the protest insist that kneeling during the anthem is a way to draw attention to the racism and police brutality that occurs within the United States. While these protests certainly have brought up the topics of race and police, in reality they have accomplished nothing. A cartoon that is circulating the internet perfectly sums up just how ineffective these protests are.
The cartoon depicts Kaepernick sitting on top of a pile of bodies, labeled “black on black murder”. In a word bubble, cartoon Kaepernick states that he’ll continue to sit until police brutally is eliminated.
Despite Kaepernick’s supposed care for violence against blacks, has said little of the bloodshed that has ravaged the black community in the form of black on black crime. In fact, 2015 data from the FBI showed that 2,380 African-Americans were killed by other African-Americans, while 229 African-Americans were killed by people identified as white.
Those are some pretty lopsided statistics, but you don’t see anyone kneeling during the national anthem protesting “black-on-black”murders — or making a stand against black crime whatsoever. That’s because these protesters don’t actually care about stopping violence against African-Americans — all they care about is themselves.
These football players see these protests as a chance to gain a following (because being professional football players apparently isn’t enough). If they cared about stopping the violence, they would do something other than kneel.
Take a look around. Have the kneeling NFL players actually accomplished anything other than dividing this nation further? Kneeling, linking arms, and even staying in the a locker room during the national anthem accomplishes nothing — all it does is show a complete lack of respect for those who sacrificed their lives for this nation.
There are racial problems in America — there’s no denying that — but trying to paint a one-sided picture of violence in the United States is only makes things worse.
Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin wanted to play football, not politics. Steelers offensive tackle Alejandro Villanueva felt he had a higher duty. Thus, the former Army Ranger was the only Steeler visible on Sunday during the playing of the national anthem before the Steelers took on the Chicago Bears.
Tomlin admitted that two days after President Donald Trump tweeted out his condemnation of anthem protests, sparking a fierce negative reaction among NFL players, he wanted unity. Tomlin had said before the game that the team would not be on the field for the anthem, citing the players’ decision. Afterward, he said he wanted to respected what his players felt was best.
“Like I said, I was looking for 100 percent participation, we were gonna be respectful of our football team,”Tomlin said.
He said he let the players decide, with one condition.
“Many of them felt like something needed to be done. I asked those guys to discuss it and whatever they discussed that we have 100 percent participation or we do nothing,”Tomlin said.
“They discussed it for an appropriate length of time and they couldn’t come to an understanding, so they chose to remove themselves from it. They were not going to be disrespectful in the anthem so they chose not to participate, but at the same time many of them were not going to accept the words of the president,”he added, saying the team decided to remain out of view.
Tomlin said his focus was the game, not the anthem.
“We’re not politicians. We’re coaches and professional athletes,”Tomlin said Sunday. “If those of us or individuals choose to participate in politics in some way I’m going to be supportive of that. But when we come out of locker rooms, we come out of locker rooms to play football games.”
Offensive tackle Chris Hubbard said the players, by a slim majority, voted in favor of staying off the field instead of standing on the sideline holding hands, but that players knew Villanueva was going to do what he wanted.
“Al was cool with it, with whatever we went through. He was on board. That’s Al, man,”Hubbard told Penn Live. “He’s a good guy.”
“We thought we were all in attention with the same agreement, obviously,”said linebacker James Harrison. “But, I guess we weren’t.”
Villanueva, A Bronze Star recipient who three tours of duty in Afghanistan, has said there is a difference between changing society and protesting during the anthem.
“I agree that America is not perfect, I agree there are lot of issues with minorities in this country, I agree we should do something about it,” Villanueva in August 2016, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “But I don’t know if the most effective way is to sit down when the national anthem of the country that is providing you freedom and providing you $16 million a year is the best way to do it when there are black minorities that are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan and protecting our freedom for less than $20,000 a year.”
“I just know I’m very thankful to be an American,”Villanueva said.
The Social Justice Warriors now rule at the University of Missouri — to the point that they’re bullying the press and ordering the campus police around.
The crowd uses their bodies to move the photographer away. Then Melissa Click — an MU professor — goes after the videographer, declaring, “Who wants to help me get this reporter out of here? I need some muscle over here.”
The outrage prompted radical leaders to tell the troops on Tuesday that media are “allowed” on campus. Click even apologized.
That’s still some progress, as was the start of faculty voting to revoke Click’s affiliation with the Journalism Department — though not her Communications Department post.
On the other hand, campus police on Tuesday emailed the student body urging kids to report incidents of “hateful and/or hurtful speech or actions.”
The quest for “safe spaces” is starting to look a lot like fascism.
All this, after all, follows the forced resignation of the school’s president and chancellor — for acting too deliberately to a series of alleged racial incidents.
Yes, it was the strike threat from African-American members of Missouri’s football team that left the prez little choice. A forfeit of this week’s game against BYU would’ve cost MU a cool $1 million.
But that just goes to another huge problem in modern academia, one we’ve warned of for years now — schools’ addiction to the cash pulled in by marquee athletic teams.
Between the anti-democratic teachings of so many professors and the profiteering of administrators, today’s campuses look rotten to the core.
What surprise, then, that a minority of extremist students can take over — or that the Social Justice crowd is all too ready to call in the police to enforce its agenda?
With all the sports media’s reporting on misconduct in the National Football League, it often gets missed that many NFL players have a deep abiding faith in Christ that guides them. Players and staff from one NFL Team, the NFC Championship bound Seattle Seahawks, may have their mind on the big game, but their hearts are with Jesus. “Jesus is better than anything we could ever hope for, even better than the Super Bowl, better than an NFL career,” said pass defense coach Rocky Leto to interviewer Pastor Mark Driscoll of the Mars Hill Church. Who are you pulling for in the Superbowl? Does this interview change your mind?
American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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damage that has been done by the seemingly endless national anthem protests, which have driven away thousands of football fans.
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