Following remarks from President Donald Trump in Alabama last Friday about firing NFL players who would not stand for the national anthem before games, a whole host of players, owners and coaches participated in pregame demonstrations in Week 3.
This included, somewhat surprisingly, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who previously had spoken out against player demonstrations, taking a knee and linking arms before the national anthem with his players.
Jones was in the news again on Wednesday when Trump tweeted that he "spoke to" the Cowboys owner, who is a "winner," and that moving forward "players will stand" for the national anthem.
Spoke to Jerry Jones of the Dallas Cowboys yesterday. Jerry is a winner who knows how to get things done. Players will stand for Country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 27, 2017
This could bring about some skepticism from various ... people. Probably including players. Jerry took a knee and linked arms but his motives have been met with plenty of skepticism.
Plus, the idea that Trump and Jones would simply have a conversation and hammer out the whole protest thing might not go over well with players. Any sort of dialogue between the players, the NFL and the president is a good thing -- Michael Bennett and Pete Carroll said they would be interested in sitting down with the president to sort out the issues or at least open up the line of conversation.
It appears very clear that there are many owners around the NFL who are interested in painting a united picture with their players. Virtually every single NFL team released a statement following the president's comments or at least participated in a demonstration.
Expect Jerry to get plenty of questions about the specifics of the conversation he had with Trump on this, particularly after his comments following Monday night's win over the Cardinals primarily featured Jones saying he felt it was best to simply move on from the entire issue altogether, and that his team's actions prior to the game spoke louder than words.