Protests against the protest, smells like chicken, beginning to sound like Christmas
Backlash from the protests during the national anthem has moved to a place of tangible damage for the National Football League.
Sure, there are myriad reasons for the NFL’s dwindling TV numbers, which to be fair are still the envy of sports and the rest of TV.
The product is worse. The rules are different. The injuries are increasing, both in terms of stars not on the field and the dwindling numbers of young people playing. The perceived over-saturation of the product, cord-cutting and everything else from Mars the planet to Mars bars in your Halloween bucket are contributing.
But to deny that the protests during the anthem have not rubbed a lot of Americans the wrong way is no longer an option.
Example 1: Papa John Schnatter, the CEO of Papa John’s Pizza, the official pizza of the NFL, has said his company’s sagging sales are due in part to its association with the NFL and the league’s failing leadership to handle the protests.
Example 2: A disabled Navy veteran, retired Cmdr. John Wells, who is the executive director of Military Veterans Advocacy, declined an award that was to be presented during a New Orleans Saints game because of the protests. He said the gesture was tainted, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
“Although I am touched and honored to be selected for such an award, the ongoing controversy with NFL players’ disrespect for the national flag forces me to decline to participate in the presentation,” Wells told the Times-Picayune. “Since this award is tainted with the dishonorable actions of the NFL and its players, I cannot accept it. To do so would be hypocritical.”
Hey, did we mention Veterans Day is right around the corner, too?
TUNE IN
Speaking of holidays, we were driving around on Halloween — yes, the last day of October — and what did we hear on the radio?
You guessed it. Christmas music. Elvis, in fact, blaring something about somebody. Eggnog may have been mentioned, and that was more than enough for me.
Heck, if it’s still October, should we expect to hear the “60 Days of Christmas” or “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Veterans Day” pretty soon?
This much is for sure: If we never hear “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” ever again, we’ll all be better off.
BATH IN A DEEP FRYER?
How about everyone’s favorite non-military officer, good ol’ Colonel Sanders?
Apparently, the colonel and Kentucky Fried Chicken have partnered with a Japanese company to produce a drumstick-shaped bath bomb that will allow you to smell like the famous 11 herbs and spices in the chain’s secret original recipe.
No word if there’s a biscuit-shaped soap or a tatersand-gravy wash cloth in the works.
(Side question: If our intelligence community made prisoners — terrorists of the worst ilk, mind you — bathe in KFC smelling salts, would that be considered cruel and unusual punishment?)
Now this is a limited-time offer that is limited to the first 100 people who reply on social media. Wonder what they will do with the 98 scented drumsticks they have left over?
Sadly, the Twitter contest is open only to people in Japan. First we drop the A-bomb on them and now we drop bath-bomb on them.
The U.N. needs to be alerted.
Contact Jay Greeson at jgreeson@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6343.