The 2017 NFL season kicks off on Sept. 7, but many players, fans and the league’s commissioner are dealing with NFL star Michael Bennett’s account of having his life threatened by police — and the ongoing Colin Kaepernick situation — as well as the threat of several groups to boycott the season.
After hearing what sounded like gun shots while leaving the Mayweather-McGregor fight in Las Vegas last weekend, Michael Bennett of the Seattle Seahawks ran for safety.
While fleeing, he says Las Vegas police singled him out and pointed their guns at him. He was soon face down on the ground with a gun pointed at his head as he was told that if he moved, they would “blow his f***ing head off.”
Bennett, who won a Super Bowl ring as a defensive end on the Seattle Seahawks in 2014, has a $30 million contract with the Seahawks.
“The officers’ excessive use of force was unbearable. I felt helpless as I lay there on the ground,” he wrote in an open letter. “My life flashed before my eyes as I thought of my girls. Would I ever play with them again?”
Not until the officers found out that he was an NFL player did they release him.
Kevin McMahill, an undersheriff with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, on Wednesday defended his fellow officers’ handling of the situation, but didn’t deny Bennett’s claim that an officer threatened to shoot him in the head. He said the department is investigating that.
“I have always held a strong conviction that protesting or standing up for justice is just simply the right thing to do. This fact is unequivocally, without question, why before every game, I sit during the national anthem — because equality doesn’t live in this country,” Bennett wrote in the letter.
As he explores his legal options, there was already a movement led by the NAACP’s Atlanta chapter for fans to boycott — or “blackout” — the NFL season until Colin Kaepernick, a quarterback most recently with the San Francisco 49ers, is hired by an NFL team.
Kaepernick didn’t stand for the national anthem while with the 49ers to protest the unequal treatment of many black people in the U.S. Other NFL players have started doing the same, but Kaepernick hasn’t been signed by another team, even though he is only 29 and has already led a team to the Super Bowl. Some say NFL owners seem afraid to sign him because of his activism, even though players who have been accused of violent crimes are signed.
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell released a statement about the incident, saying, “Michael Bennett represents the best of the NFL — a leader on his team and in his community.” He added, “The issues Michael has been raising deserve serious attention from all of our leaders in every community.”
No comments:
Post a Comment