joining us now is veteran NBC sports broadcaster Bob Costas Bob great to have
you out so here on the snoring you've seen it all in this business what's your
reaction to what happened this weekend the reaction is so universal including
from prominent NFL owners who have supported and donated to Trump's
campaign and to his inaugural committee bob across the board and you have not
heard a single person within the NFL raise a voice in support of what Trump
said Rex Ryan says he's appalled and now ashamed that he once introduced Trump at
a rally in Buffalo where he then was the coach what's happened here is that what
was already an issue raised primarily by Colin Kaepernick has expanded beyond the
specific point that Kaepernick was trying to make which is a very valid
point and now has become near-universal disgust with the president's insulting
remarks your friend Peter King noted that last week there are fewer than 10
NFL players who Neal did it some kind of protests this weekend depending on how
you count it 250 include AI entire teams how significant is that to see a
movement like that I can't think of anything like that ever in the NFL no
but the president has galvanized players of all backgrounds of all beliefs Drew
Brees and his complete statement says that he'd never would feel comfortable
not standing for the national anthem but he would stand locking arms with his
fellow players black and white or with a hand on the shoulder of a black player
who is expressing his point of view and he pointedly said that he found the
president's remarks inappropriate which is kind I mean you know what's
interesting is the president could have used this as a teachable moment to say
here's why I believe we should stand for the national anthem here's what I
believe it stands for but he took a different tact and it has I mean look we
saw what that was happening with just the fans yelling at each other you know
there is something contagious about divisive Ness yeah and it plays in
certain quarters you stir people's emotions and resentments that's actually
a business plan in certain quarters of the
or cable television it's a business plan and it's the way President Trump for
better or worse approached his campaign and approaches his presidency to give
him the extreme benefit of the doubt extreme benefit of the doubt you'd say
he's insensitive to the racial implications to make comments like this
at a rally in Alabama all right he likes sheep applause lines which has no
football team and he delivered them has no football electro football team yeah
and they're they're rabid football fans down there that's to give them the
extreme benefit of the doubt but do you want a President of the United States
who even if you're giving him the benefit of that doubt is so tone deaf to
the racial implications of this it's interesting because this morning one of
the things the president has written he writes the issue of kneeling has nothing
to do with race it's about respect for our country flag a national anthem NFL
must respect this now if you take your attack there and say giving him the
extreme benefit of the doubt maybe for him to the extreme benefit that it out
the issue of kneeling isn't about race but for the players especially the
players initially to say it's not about race that's not true 70 percent of the
players in the NFL roughly are African American
virtually every player who knelt in the initial stages of this was black and the
initial impetus from it before it came from Colin Kaepernick and it was about
police brutality and mistreatment of African Americans you can't separate
those two things now if you want to make the point that the national anthem is
about something more than the nation's flaws and shortcomings it's also about
its ideals and that people can see some texture to what the national anthem
means and you might prefer that people protest or make their point outside of
the national anthem that's something that can be argued but the idea that
this doesn't have something to do with race is preposterous michael steele
african american former head of the Republican National Committee was
unsparing in his remarks about what Trump had to say Bob Kraft who
contributed to the inaugural committee you're not gonna find many voices of
support outside his base is a scream base for these remarks Tom Brady
I mean Tom Brady back he said this morning I believe this yeah just this
morning on a radio show I certainly disagree with what he said I thought it
was divisive have we heard from Colin Kaepernick no and I don't expect that we
will because he's been quiet for a long long time sometimes he tweets some
things out I think it's actually a good thing that this has gone now beyond
Colin Kaepernick and I'll tell you why but we have to give Kaepernick credit
first of all taking a knee the first game he sat and then it occurred to him
maybe sitting seems contemptuous kneeling can be an act of grace Tim
Tebow knelt at various times it can be an act of grace and an act of respect
but Kaepernick has whether people know it or not has raised and or donated
millions and millions of dollars to worthy causes he's walking the walk he's
involved in the community but Kaepernick himself was an imperfect messenger he's
given to saying things like I don't vote because the oppressor will never let you
vote your way out of your oppression so I guess it doesn't matter to him who
wound up being president of the United States it doesn't matter that when he
first knelt Barak Obama was president and now someone who many of his fellow
African Americans and importantly many of his fellow citizens of all races and
backgrounds object to it doesn't matter to him he sometimes what Colin says when
he does speak makes it sound as if and I say this with great respect for his
intentions and for what he has done beyond kneeling on the field sometimes
he sounded like someone who took one semester from a radical professor when
he was a freshman and that's all he knows about the world so I think it's
better that additional voices hear from multiple backgrounds weigh in because
Colin Kaepernick despite what some people want to say is not the natural
heir to Muhammad Ali or Arthur Ashe or to Kareem abdul-jabbar who continues to
be a public intellectual he's not he's he's done he's tried to do a good thing
from his heart I don't know that he's equipped to carry that baton in whether
or not he's the right person for he's being punished I don't think there's any
question right he has the talent to be playing football right now and he's now
yeah because of this he's better than some starters and better than most
backups let me ask you again about a lot of where the debate is about right now
because you hear from the president you certainly hear it from his cabinet
including Steve manoosh and I'm not sure we have that quote but the Treasury
secretary went on TV this weekend and said this isn't about race it's about
respect for the military and first responders and when you kneel you're
disrespecting the military and first responders part of what's happened is
that sports and patriotism and the flag have been conflated to such an extent
that people can't separate out any nuance if you go to see Hamilton which
is about the founding of the Republic no one says wait don't raise the curtain
until we hear the national anthem when you went to see Private Ryan
no one said turn off the projector Saving Private Ryan no one said turn off
the projector until we've had the national anthem it's in sports where
this stuff happens sometimes movingly sometimes I'd submit cynically because
wrapping yourself in the flag and honoring the military is something which
no one is going to object to we all respect their sacrifice we all honor
their sacrifice and yet what it has come to mean is that the flag is primarily
and only about the military this is no disrespect to the military it's a huge
part of the narrative but Martin Luther King was a patriot susan b anthony was a
patriot dissidents are patriots school teachers and social workers are
patriots and yet at Yankee Stadium if we can shift sports not only do they play
the national anthem before the game but they play god Bless America at the
seventh-inning stretch 81 times a year at home games and in
every case they say please rise as the Yankees honor a military guest I have no
problem with that I stand every time in the ballpark no
matter what it is I stand and I certainly respect the military person
they bring out there but there's never a schoolteacher there's never a social
worker patriotism comes in many forms and what has happened is that it's been
conflated with with kind of a bumper sticker kind of flag waving and with the
military only so that people cannot see that in his own way colin
kaepernick however imperfectly is doing a patriotic thing and so too are some of
these other players what do you think this does this season for football do
you think that it will hurt ratings no I think creases interesting yes yesterday
every telecast including Sunday Night Football on NBC showed the National
Anthem generally speaking and this is interesting
generally speaking be at baseball football whatever the network's try to
cover the national anthem they try to be in commercial I've heard it in my ear
where the producer says wait a minute they may still be in the anthem when we
come out of this commercial and sometimes they are and then you're just
quiet for the last few notes and you note that the anthem has concluded now
people want to see the anthem they're interested in it how long it lasts we'll
have to wait and see by the way I did this may this is not as important but in
his comments in Alabama Trump went on to say that they're ruining the NFL there's
not enough hitting there I guess sisse fiying the game you wonder how many
times people who believe that have themselves been hit in the head the
science is clear and the more that science emerges the more it will become
clear that football and brain trauma are linked it doesn't matter how much you
like the game they are linked and to deny that is to live in a fantasy world
when you hear people say that sports is about entertainment sports it is about
distraction sports is about something other than politics politics shouldn't
be in sports largely true but sometimes they intersect inevitably and to ignore
it is to ignore the elephant in the room when I commented about various issues
only occasionally on NBC being on football or during the Olympics it was
never during the action it was never at the expense of the action and the drama
it was always in a little niche that was carved out when nothing else was going
on in terms of the game itself but you have to acknowledge these things and you
have to address them they're important and very often because sports appeals
across demographic lines like nothing else we live in a niche world but the
one thing that draws not only a large audio
but a varied audience outside of the Academy Awards in the Emmys I guess the
one thing that draws that kind of across-the-board interest is big sports
events and and very often that's where these issues play themselves out I heard
a little bit of relevant history yesterday that I think is important to
just reiterate and that is that before 2009 the players often worked on the
field for the national anthem something changed and patriotism became a larger
component of all this sometimes paid patriotism yeah and so yesterday what
did you think of the teams that stayed in the locker room for the national
anthem they released statement saying we believe in patriotism we believe in our
flag and we believe in our first responders that they stayed in a locker
room what did you I was ok with it I think
what Mike Tomlin said the coach of the Steelers made a lot of sense so we don't
want our players to have to choose they may feel one way they may feel another
they may be apolitical so we'll stay off villanueva one of the players for the
Steelers who was an Army Ranger in Afghanistan came out of the locker room
and stood at the edge of the field not on the field but sort of at the at the
lip of the runway that would lead to the field with his hand over his heart and
that was his decision to make and I would respect that to what cross the
line specifically do you think what broke the dam here
well would you call people's sons of bitches across the board that offends
everybody white and black they've stood shoulder-to-shoulder on those fields in
those locker rooms what kind of a statement is that to make and I don't
think it's irrelevant that clearly the President had more passion and
conviction for those remarks than he did when he finally got around after
equivocating to distancing himself to some extent from white nationalists and
neo-nazis you he clearly had more fervor for this than for that it's one thing to
take a knee or raise a fist it's your right and there's a point here to be
made but I hope others follow Kaepernick's lead not in some of the
naive political statements he's occasionally made but in getting
involved in the community and actually doing things which many NFL players
already do but it's just not spotlighted it's not
just the NFL NBA Major League Baseball whatever it may be and I think it would
the reason why Kaepernick is an imperfect messenger is that you think
about Muhammad Ali a different time and of course he was a transcendent figure
and he was so entertaining even when he was polarizing people couldn't take
their eyes off him he was so charismatic and magnetic but you need people out
there articulating as a few did this weekend out there articulating we love
our country we support the military we know that most policemen not only are
not guilty of misbehavior but many of them are heroic and
dedicated many of them are themselves African America merican or Hispanic and
they're dedicated to protecting and serving people of all backgrounds we get
that but there is still a problem and it and that problem a police brutality
specifically is real it's true it's urgent and because it it's connected
historically to the mistreatment of African Americans by government by the
justice system and by the police because it's connected it resonates all the more
if people can make those distinctions and voice those distinctions rather than
just kneeling or rather than just raising a fist then then the
conversations really on and I hope it goes there it's hard to say all of what
you just said on Twitter which is I think one of the problems right now yeah
that's my ship in this country that's right it's a complicated and portable
discussion the world that plays its discussions out on social media is not a
world of texture and nuance now Bob Costas thank you for being part of the
conversation with us thank you all