After Fiasco In Kansas City Involving Chiefs And Houston Texans, Roger Goodell Must Get Rid Of Black National Anthem

With the Houston Texans and the Miami Dolphins firing warning shots Thursday to NFL honchos, well, um.

Let’s put it this way . . .

Any moment now, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell will announce he’ll end the league’s dumb idea of having the Black national anthem played before the Star-Spangled Banner prior to every game during Week One of the season.

OK, Goodell should do that, especially since he’s always talking about protecting the shield of his league that made a record $16 billion last year.

For one, this dual national anthem thing is a clumsy attempt by league officials, owners and their lieutenants to show they really are woke regarding the epidemic of sports folks joining the Black Lives Matter movement after the senseless killing of George Floyd in May by that Minneapolis cop.

For another, it’s the latest effort by the NFL to coverup that, in a league with 70 percent Black players, there are just three Black head coaches among the 32 teams and two black general managers, and there is no Colin Kaepernick playing quarterback for anybody heading into his fourth year of getting blackballed by the league for starting a social justice movement the league now supports.

Yeah. Don’t ask.

For another, when it comes to playing both national anthems before NFL or any games, it’s just dumb.

The Texans did the somewhat predictable (just keep reading) Thursday night in Kansas City. They refused to leave their locker room for either of those anthems before they faced the world champion Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium during the NFL’s opening game of the season.

According to NBC sideline reporter Michele Tafoya during the nationally televised game on her network, the Texans decided as a team to boycott both anthems to make sure there would be “no misinterpretation” they were celebrating one song over the other.

That makes sense. I predicted for Forbes.com in early August this whole “double national anthem” thing would get messy for many reasons.

Take the Chiefs, for instance. They were the anti-Texans. They locked arms along one of the end zones during the Black national anthem called Lift Every Voice and Sing, and except for kneeling linebacker Alex Okafor, they stood as a team for The Star-Spangled Banner on their sidelines.

The Texans of DeShaun Watson eventually left their locker room to join arms with the Chiefs of Patrick Mahomes on the field for a so-called moment of unity regarding the push by many NFL players against social injustice and police brutality.

It’s just that, even though barbecue is the only thing as popular in Kansas City as the Chiefs, the hometown players were booed with the visitors by those among the reduced crowd of 15,895 due to COVID-19.

Those boos could have been nastier.

Imagine if the Chiefs had followed the Texans’ lead, and more than a few teams will do just that, starting with the Dolphins.

Or was it the other way around?

Various Dolphins players announced Thursday through a slick video done as poetry that they won’t take the field Sunday in New England against the Patriots for either national anthem.

“This attempt to unify only creates more divide. So we’ll skip this song and dance, and as a team we’ll stay inside,” those Dolphins players said in that video of two minutes and 17 seconds. “We need changed hearts, not just a response to pressure. Enough, no more fluff and empty gestures. We need owners with influence and pockets bigger than ours to call up officials and flex political power.”

‘

Other teams may not rhyme while explaining why they won’t leave their locker rooms Sunday or Monday night for both national anthems.

They’ll just stay away.

Then again, some players may do . . . whatever regarding one anthem over the other or for both of them.

Yeah, Roger.

You know what you have to do.

So do it now.