Washington Football Team veteran quarterback Alex Smith voiced his comments on the former Redskins earning a place in the spotlight due to several sexual harassment allegations.
In an exposé published by the Washington Post last week, 15 women — most of which were former employees of the Washington organization — accused some ex-top executives of the alleged misconduct. The team, apparently, also mishandled the accusations.
Sure enough, Smith is not happy with the issue, especially since he is a husband to a loving wife, a father to a daughter, and a brother to two sisters.
Article Continues Below“We're football players, and out on the field but there are a lot of parts of the building that go into game day and a season and the whole business side of the building, and to hear that some of this had been going on, I certainly don't think players ever knew about it, but it's not something any of us are proud of and it needs to be changed,” Alex Smith said, per Stephania Bell of ESPN. “I have a wife, a daughter, two sisters, and to ever think about something like that happening to them disgusts me and pisses me off so hopefully we get to where we need to be, an environment and a culture that's acceptable for everybody and lets everybody thrive and is safe for everybody.”
Washington has seen an onslaught of accusations and scandals these past few weeks in the lead-up to the NFL's 2020 training camp. The NFC East club first announced a long-awaited move away from “Redskins” as the organization's nickname — a name that has stood for eight decades since moving to the D.C. area.
Earlier this week saw an official, temporary renaming of the club as the “Washington Football Team.”
Amid the renaming issue, the Post's story on the mishandling of sexual harassment surfaced. It was paired with Washington firing or letting go various executives who were accused of causing such incidents.
Alex Smith, a former first-overall NFL pick who arrived at Washington via trade in 2018, is hoping D.C. cleans up its act and learns an “acceptable” culture.