06-06-2018, 11:40 AM
(06-06-2018, 11:32 AM)Nately120 Wrote: Yeah, but I have to assume the NFL wasn't as sure that it could just fire any player who protested if enough players called their bluff on it. That's what Trump and his supporters want, I assume.
I've made this point in the past. Willie Gay was fined for wearing purple cleats to raise domestic violence awareness. His mother was murdered in front of him by his father. If you can punish that guy for that gesture then you can easily punish people for protesting, or making any statement not approved by the league, while on the job. Any such policy, executed consistently and fairly (admittedly not a Goodell strong point) will be upheld in court and the players will eventually acknowledge the league's right to this position.
Quote:At any rate, the NFL doing anything in an attempt to please Trump and/or convince him to stop targeting them would be a fool's errand in my mind. They have an entire labor pool to worry about, because Trump is never going to stop this.
You're looking at this through Trump glasses. Trump didn't create the situation, he exacerbated it. Yes, I've heard the arguments that the protests were dying down before Trump reignited them. I think that's a bit of revisionist history but I also know that people who were upset about the protests didn't start being upset the minute Trump weighed in. Quite simply, Trump just kept the issue in the mainstream limelight, but NFL fans already had their opinions on the subject decided.
Trump is very good at finding meaningless issues he can whip up a furor over. The NFL's mistake was in letting there be an issue for him to target. They made the classic business mistake of doing nothing rather than taking decisive action. They let the tide and currents of the news cycle control this topic and shape the narrative. They have no one but themselves to blame for the current situation.
