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This issue has gone far past the gridiron and has now become more a coastal beef between the people of the United States who stand for this country, and those who choose to kneel. These actions by Kaepernick are now affecting people all over the world including myself. At my very own college football against Mount Ida I spotted out several opposing teammates on their knee with their head down and arms chained together to symbol they kneel together. This was week two of my football season, the very beginning of Kaepernick's rise to fame. This was the first time that I had seen anyone perform this act with my own eyes and it really hit me instantly. There were some boos and some cheers from the fans, but all together just made the situation very confusing. I didn’t know exactly how to feel. To be honest I never really thought this situation would have an affect or impact me the way it did on that Saturday morning. The great thing about this country is that they have the option to be able to kneel during the "National Anthem" because of freedom of speech! This did not, however, make any big story lines because little did I know these acts soon started occurring everywhere, at every level of sports.
For weeks in my classes this seemed to be the only thing we would talk about and here we are months later still talking about this same issue. It is now week seven for the NFL and Colin Kaepernick has continued to kneel before every game that has been played this year. More and more fellow football players in
the NFL have taken a knee to voice their opinion on the ongoing racial discrepancy as
well. This problem has
caused a lot of off-the-
field unneeded
attention and issues for
the San Francisco 49ers organization as well as the Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, and Miami Dolphins. Other organizations, such as the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks, unite during these tough times as two Patriots players (Team captain Devin Mccourty and Martellus Bennett) stood with their fists raised. As for the Seahawks, they responded to Kaepernick by all standing together linking their arms together (ESPN 2016). One of the craziest parts about this kneeling epidemic in our country is that this is only the beginning and one sport! NBA star of the Oklahoma City Thunder Victor Oladipo was asked in an interview about this issue and if he thinks this could affect players in the NBA and if he believes there will be players kneeling for the "National Anthem," Oladipo responded, “Oh, no question, I truly believe it will. Because at the end of the day it's a sport, and people are gonna be looking at some guys in the NBA to see what they're gonna do as well. At the end of the day you just control what you can control, so your opinion is your opinion. That's the beauty of the United States, so, do whatever you feel is best that will help you do whatever you believe” (Bengtson 2016). I can only imagine how bad this problem could be in the NBA, due to the fact that their rosters are much smaller (53 man roster in NFL compared to 15 in the NBA) making it much easier to convince fellow teammates to join the protest. Also how many more games the NBA plays compared to the NFL. In the NFL the regular season is 16 games and if a team makes it to the Superbowl can play as many as 20 games total during the year. An NBA player if they stay healthy can play as many 82 games during the regular season and could be a n additional 28 games in the postseason. We very easily could see entire NBA teams kneeling during the "National Anthem."
Wagoner, Nick. “Colin Kaepernick continues anthem protest; other 49ers, Rams join.” ESPN. Santa Clara,
California: 2016. Web. 17 Oct. 2016.
Bengtson, Russ. “Victor Oladipo: "No Question" Colin Kaepernick's Protests Will Transfer to NBA”. Complex.
2016. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.
Wile, Rob. “20 years before Colin Kaepernick, an NBA player refused to stand for the national anthem and
paid dearly.” Fusion. 2016. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
Heitner, Darren. “Colin Kaepernick continues anthem protest; other 49ers, Rams join.” *updated article*
Forbes. 2016. Web. 3 Dec. 2016.
ESPN staff. “NFL players who protested during the national anthem in Week 6” ESPN.2016. Web.
17 Oct. 2016.