The Kansas City Chiefs and the Houston Texans kick off the 2020 NFL regular season with Week 1's “Thursday Night Football.”
Usually, this game has a lot of implications for the rest of the league. It serves as a tone-setter for the regular season.
However, this year it possibly means more than ever before. Because it is not just going to be the two teams setting the tone of the field. But before the game as well.
With everything going on, we have seen a lot of protests and discussions in professional sports when it comes to social and racial injustices in the world. And now it is the NFL's turn. So what are they going to do?
Well according to Tom Pelissero of NFL Network, the Chiefs and Texans have discussed staying in their locker rooms during the National Anthem as a protest.
#Chiefs and #Texans players have been in talks about a joint demonstration before tonight’s NFL kickoff game that makes a statement on racial injustice and shows unity, per sources.
One possibility discussed: Both teams staying in the locker room during the national anthem.
— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) September 10, 2020
Pelissero also comments that the plans are fluid. They have not decided anything yet and could change what they end up doing.
However, as of right now this is certainly on the table. This also would not be that much of a difference despite what a lot of people believe. The NFL did not start having players on the field for the National Anthem full time until 2009.
So not much more than 10 years ago, players tended not to be on the field for the National Anthem in the first place.
With that in mind, this should not be a crazy concept to a lot of people. It is simply going back to what we saw barely a decade ago.
It will be interesting to see what the two teams decide to do. Will they end up agreeing on something and having some unity in their protest? Or will they decide to do their own separate things?
And of course the big question is, what will the protest actually be? As of right now staying in the locker rooms is a very real possibility, but it might not be their final decision.
It looks like this is something we might need to wait to see later tonight on “Thursday Night Football.”
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