Just a few short months ago when George Floyd and Breonna Taylor were both victims of police brutality, Ditka once again reiterated in July that athletes who are protesting the anthem should “get the hell out” of the United States. And following this week’s NFL games, for a third time Ditka spoke out on the players who knelt during the anthem.
“Football’s football. It’s not a complicated thing. You’re playing the game, you’re enjoying the game. You don’t like the game, get out of it,” Ditka said in an interview with Newsmax TV on Monday. “It’s not for protesting one way or the other. What color you are, what you think, this or that. You play football. That’s it. You’re privileged. You got a gift from God that you can play the game because you got a body you can do it with. I don’t really understand what you’re protesting. I played the game. I coached the game for a long time. It makes no sense to me.”