nfl owners scared of trumpfrom half
NFL owners are in full panic, piss their pants scared mode right now.
Everyone is pissed at Jeffrey Lurie. EVERYONE. The owners had hoped caving to Trump with their half-measure, would buy them some time and leyway with Trump. Yes, he was still insulting them. But there was a hope that shit would die down, since they effectively bent over backwards to him.
But Lurie and his antics has reduced any truce to ash and cinder.
Lurie had a player revolt; the players boycotting not going to the White House started threatening the players and staff who said they DID want to go. As a compromise, he tried to do a thing where the entire team would go to DC and the boycotting players would do PR crap with kids while the 80s people who would go would get the White House visit. There is even audio (currently locked away in a bank safety deposit locker) of Chris Long THREATENING one player, vowing to do physical harm to the player in question if he went to the White House.
The boycotting players kept threatening and bullying more and more people into backing out. Lurie then went about trying to reschedule the trip for when Trump would not be at the White House. This was something Trump saw through and in the end, combined with the fact that only a handfull of people were left still wanting to go? This led to Trump disinviting them.
That said, this has the other NFL owners pissed off. Combined with the Warriors and Cavs both vowing NOT to go to the White House, this leads some to fear Trump will cancel ALL future White House invites for sports teams and him salting the earth in the process, so that no future President does it after he's gone Worse still, is that this has got owners terrified that Trump is now going to respond to this humiliation, by going scorch earth on the NFL. Goodell and the owners know, that Trump knows that going after the NFL is good business in terms of firing up his base. The NFL knows the kneeling shit has hurt them big time, financially. And they already are fearful that the players may revolt over the half-measure compromise with Trump over the anthem protest. And that Goodell, realizing how badly the ship is sinking due to his inaction, might just go nuclear on the teams if players violate the protest bans. Especially on teams where the owners are on record for paying any fines.
There is legit fear that any protesting at the anthem will result in fines so severe that owners will have no choice but to squash any further protests during anthem time, due to them not wanting to have to shell out several hundred thousands of dollars per player.
Similarly, there is fear that if entire teams stay in the locker room? That fan response will be equally draconian. IE they fear that fans will walk out of games and that Trump will use teams in the locker room to basically stir up his base to create the feared "Red Wave" to keep Congress Republican.
But Lurie is in everyone's dog house now. The NFL has started to realize the extent to which Trump's vendetta against them goes. How he knows that half the country is with Trump on hating the NFL. And that no matter how hard the left tries to hijack shit, Trump and his bully pulpit gives him 100% control over the narrative with voters. And the people who actually put their money where their mouth is on boycotting.