Bengals, Adam Jones won’t protest anthem: ‘There’s nowhere like America’
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When “The Star-Spangled Banner” is played before the Cincinnati Bengals’ game against the New York Giants, Adam Jones says players will stand as a team because “there’s nowhere like America.”
Jones and his teammates took a sidetrip Saturday to the Sept. 11 memorial at Ground Zero in downtown Manhattan and Jones described how moved he was and why he does not agree with players, like Colin Kaepernick, who protest police violence against minorities by not standing for the playing of the national anthem.
Jones, often known for incidents on and off the field, described the emotional experience of going to Ground Zero in an interview with ESPN’s Josina Anderson and the patriotism he feels about the anthem.
“It was real sentimental. You go and — when you’re not in New York, you kind of take things for granted, but to go out there and see the firefighters — I got to meet a couple of guys that were there on 9/11 15 years ago and made it out, got to talk to some of the family members of the 350 fighters that didn’t make it so — when you put things in perspective, life is only so short,” he said. “It made you think about life and not just the little things. Life is so very precious. It was kind of hard, man. I was just trying to pay my respects.”
Jones said he disagrees with players like Kaepernick who choose to kneel.
“Whatever works for him works for him, but me personally, like I just told you, I wanted to see the memorial,” he said. “I got to talk to a lot of the families, I have family members that’s in the Army. It’s a different kind of [thing] with me. I have a lot of respect for this country. I’ve been all the way around the country — any place you can pretty much name, I’ve been. I can tell you there’s nowhere like America.
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