Revered football player and coach Mike Ditka lambasted protesting NFL players Tuesday.
“Is that the stage for this?” he asked. “If you want to protest, or whatever you want to protest, you’ve got a right to do that, but I think you’re a professional athlete, you have an obligation to the game. I think you have to respect the game.”
Disgruntled players have transformed the NFL into something that it was never intended to be. A football game should be relaxing. The only stress fans used to experience came from their team’s losses.
Now players are using the field for political demonstrations.
“That’s what I think is the most important thing. I don’t see a lot of respect for the game. I just see respect for their own individual opinions. Opinions are like noses, we all have one. Some are good. Some are bad,” Ditka added.
The NFL protest is, unfortunately, still chugging along. Ditka went even further in his denunciation.
“If you don’t respect our country, then you shouldn’t be in this country playing football… Go to another country and play football. If you had to go somewhere else to try to play the sport, you wouldn’t have a job… If you can’t respect the flag and the country, then you don’t respect what this is all about. So I would say, adios,” he said.
A lot of people share Ditka’s opinion. Even people who agree with the protest’s premise think that venue is inappropriate.
Ditka, however, doesn’t find their complaints to be reasonable at all.
“All of a sudden, it’s become a big deal now, about oppression…There has been no oppression in the last 100 years that I know of. Now maybe I’m not watching it as carefully as other people,” the football legend said.
(Source: Daily Caller)