Frustrated in Philly, players sack
PAP HILADELPHIA — The Giants’ silence on President Trump’s blatant racism and disrespect for First Amendment rights is over. The players stood for the national anthem last season and even at first this fall. But after Trump’s Friday attack on black NFL players’ rights, they’d had it.
“I don’t care if you’re the President or not,” said Olivier Vernon, one of three Giants to kneel for Sunday’s anthem, of what he called Trump’s attempt to criminalize free speech. “You ain’t my President.”
The entire team locked arms in solidarity for Sunday’s anthem, including coach Ben McAdoo going arm-in-arm with Eli Manning and Geno Smith. The Giants’ owners John Mara and Steve Tisch notably were not on the sideline with the team, as Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie was at the 50-yard line with his players.
The players, however, unloaded on Trump in an emotional locker room after their last-second loss, sick of Trump’s label of any protesting player as a “son of a bitch” who should be fired.
“I’m really disappointed in President Trump’s remarks,” Brandon Marshall said, trying to keep his cool. “That just proves, this is the most powerful man in the country, and for him to stand up and say that, it shows what we feel is real. That’s what we’re saying. Exactly how President Trump talked, that’s what we’re talking about.”
It was awe-inspiring, honestly, to listen to Giants players, many of them quiet on the subject for so long, finally make their true feelings public. It was clear many of them have had a lot to say for a while but held it in either out of respect for the Giants team or organization’s preferences, or fear of Colin Kaepernick-type employment repercussions, or simply because they previously were able to ignore the nonsense.
And then to see the pressure they felt to figuratively stand up on Sunday — or to kneel down, as Vernon, Landon Collins and Damon Harrison did — and how they went about it; this was leadership.
Neither of Vernon’s parents, for example, was born in America. He is first generation. His father is Jamaican, a retired police officer with 25 years in South Beach Miami, Fla., and his mother is Swiss. And Vernon said he and his dad have discussed “what’s been going on in this country” often and “he knows it’s not right.”
“I had a lot of patience from last year for what’s going on, and I respect this nation, this country,” Vernon said. “Shoot, I’m a first generation American. My parents ain’t from this country. (But) all those remarks just built up and I think just last night, just hearing that, kind of struck a chord … So I just did what was necessary.
“It’s crazy. It’s an emotional thing that can get you really, really angry, regardless of what type of person you are,” Vernon said. “Just because you’ve got money or whatever and you play in a high level sport, you’re supposed to be OK with what’s going on? I don’t understand how that’s right. So I’m just gonna continue what I’m doing as a citizen of the U.S.”
Collins said he knelt with his teammates to show support but was “about to break down in tears” because he does love this country and clearly felt pained to be put in this position.
“We love our country to death,” Collins said. “We’d die for it, too, if we can. But at the same time, we respect each other and we have a family over here. We gonna fight for each other … People out there are going to hate us. People out there that’s not gonna respect us. At the end of the day we respect our opinion and everyone has freedom of speech.”
Casillas, a team captain, meanwhile was appalled with Trump, and said “it sucks that we’ve got to listen to this crap all the time.”
“I’m not a fan of his,” he said. “For the President to go ahead and call us a son of a bitch for doing what we’re right to do, what the people that fought for our flag — that’s what they’re fighting for, for our freedom and our right to be able do stuff like that.