Ya know, I look at this the same way I look at children who are misbehaving in public as the parents stand idly by. The players are simply doing what their coaches, team owners and the NFL as a business enterprise will allow... for whatever reason. So, while I'm truly not sure all of the players are on the same page with statement they believe they're making -- there seem to be several different messages -- if the business enterprise they work for has said you're free to exercise your 1st amendment rights then it is what it is. I may not like it, but that's part of what made our nation different from so many others. Now, the recent trend in terms of the double standard for "acceptable" and unacceptable free speech. Uh, you can't have it both ways. That's censorship.

Anyway, the NFL and most of the owners have clearly decided what they think is the least financially risky approach to dealing with this nonsense and the bottom line is the bottom line when you're running a billion dollar entertainment business. I don't buy the stuff that the NFL's advertisers are selling and don't watch TV other than when certain sporting events catch my interest and even then it's mostly background noise.

So, for me it's the owner's and NFL that I'm looking at, not the players. They're just testing the limits of their employers and their collective bargaining agreements