by Alex Poletti
Photo by Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports
Amid a summer of protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement that saw the NFL officially condemn systemic racism, the league was rocked with its own scandal when Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeSean Jackson shared an antisemitic quote falsely attributed to Adolf Hitler on Instagram. Roger Goodell was swift to act, however, levying a harsh punishment by awarding the wideout a share of the Washington football team.
“I want to make clear that DeSean’s views are not representative of the NFL,” Goodell said in a press conference, lying. “This is not what the NFL stands for. However, hateful language is exactly what Washington’s football team stands for, so we thought this would be a good fit.”
Analysts at The Second String predict that this punishment will earn him at least double the $27 million contract he signed with the Eagles last year. His role as a partial owner is still unclear, but most experts agree that he will probably have to talk to Dan Snyder more than once, which is as close as the NFL can come to an Eighth Amendment violation.
Washington has long been the most hateful team in the NFL, having a racial slur as a name since 1932 that makes Cleveland’s baseball team sound cutesy. The team announced on Monday that they would be retiring the name, coming to that conclusion after it finally became an economic concern for them. This history of prejudice makes it the perfect fit for Jackson, whose comments stirred controversy around the sports world this week.
“I’m glad the commissioner decided to act quickly on this matter,” Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie says. “I almost had to threaten to fire him, which would have caused a whole host of other issues. We don’t fire people in this league for petty things like antisemitism or domestic abuse. Only for protesting about issues that we end up agreeing with four years later.”
It seems that Jackson has already made amends for his comments, apologizing on Twitter and promising to do better in the future.
“I am deeply sorry for my antisemitic comments, which my lawyer told me not to publicly admit I still believe,” Jackson tweeted on Sunday. “I will accept the punishment Roger Goodell has given me and do my best working in a position of immense power making millions of dollars like so many antisemites have before me.”
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