Turns Out the Steelers Were Not Hiding in a Locker Room

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Our recent stories about the Steelers and Mr. Villanueva were based on MSM reporting but they weren’t totally accurate. CBS Sports and a photo tell a different story from the original.

The reports about the Steelers deciding to hang out in the locker room weren’t accurate in the end. The Steelers decided to head for the tunnel, not stay in the locker room, and Mr. Villanueva accidentally ended up at the front of the line in the tunnel.

Media reports said: Steelers remain in locker room for national anthem before Bears game in Chicago [Sporting News]; Steelers coach Mike Tomlin: Team will stay in locker room, not participate during national anthem [Local 4]; Mike Tomlin explains why Steelers will stay in locker room during national anthem [NFL].

We thought they were hiding in the locker room.

In fact, they were all in the tunnel and no one was kneeling.

This is the photo most people saw.

The next photo shows what happened. The leg you see in the foreground is Mr. Villanueva’s.

All the Steelers were present and standing behind him. They were trying to remain neutral originally but scrapped the plan and were heading out when the anthem began playing, according to the latest reports.

After the incident, a report came out that Villanueva had gone rogue and avoided his teammates on purpose, which is what it looked like to his fellow teammates.

His teammates were confused as to how he ended up in full view.

As it happens, Mr. Villanueva crept up to see a flag for the anthem and the team was about to join him when the anthem started.

Mr. Villanueva’s public display was an accident.

The former Army Ranger and war hero apologized, which he certainly didn’t have to do.

“Every single time I see that picture of me standing by myself, I feel embarrassed,” Villanueva said, via the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “This national anthem ordeal has sort of been out of control, and there’s a lot of blame on myself. Every single one of my teammates is extremely supportive and extremely patriotic. I can honestly said that.”

“Unfortunately, I threw (my teammates) under the bus, unintentionally,” Villanueva said. “I made Coach Tomlin look bad, and that is my fault and my fault only. I made my teammates look bad, and that is my fault.”

“For anybody who thinks that Coach Tomlin is not as patriotic as you can get in America … I’m offended by that,” Villanueva said. “I will support all my teammates, and all my teammates and all my coaches have always supported me.”

The Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger also said that, like Villanueva, he doesn’t believe in the form of protesting that’s been taking place across the NFL.

“I personally don’t believe the anthem is ever the time to make any type of protest,” Roethlisberger said. “For me, and many others on my team and around the league, it is a tribute to those who commit to serve and protect our country, current and past, especially the ones that made the ultimate sacrifice.”

Mr. Villanueva doesn’t see the kneeling protests as disrespectful of the military and the country. On that we choose to disagree.

If this version of the story is true, why was the coach so angry? We are trying to find the truth and it’s not easy.


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Linda Hopkins
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Linda Hopkins
6 years ago

Good, bad, or indifferent, the forces behind the scene have taken it upon themselves to promote what was a singularly inane gesture by Kaepernick. . . They ARE the same iconoclasts trying to create division amongst Americans in any way possible, such as degrading the Confederate flag and statues and declaring everything racist if you disagree. . . There is a time and a place AND A METHOD by which protest can give voice to people who feel they are being overlooked and their concerns unnoticed, but during the National Anthem is not the time, and the burning of American flags is not the object in question. . . There are dark forces at work in our country who seek to divide and conquer America and there are truly ignorant Americans willing to participate in the madness in a very misguided fashion. . .There are also the evil ones, who know exactly what they are doing and don’t think for a nanosecond that this is not taking place, for it surely is taking place before your very eyes. . . We owe it to our Forefathers, those that have fought to defend our rights and our country to step up to this new challenge by the “community organizer(s)” and the BIG money people who pull our strings to get a all too predictable reaction from the masses to steer us into a frenzy so they can get the desired end result they are looking to achieve to further their agenda and cement our fate to that which THEY desire. . . Will America wake up and see the evidence that abounds, or will we continue to be led by our noses into the chutes like so many cattle to slaughter ? . . It is incumbent upon each and every American to seek out the truth and decide if We The People are collectively in charge of our own destiny as Americans and will remain the “Keeper of the Keys” to America, or surrender our rights to those “Community DISorganizers” and Moneymen who seek to destroy us. . . I’ve made my decision, how about you ?

michaelrbuley
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michaelrbuley
6 years ago
Reply to  Linda Hopkins

Brilliantly and perfectly summarized, Linda. Everything is at stake. The ignorance of Americans is so vast, by design and decades of undermining education and every other institution, that we shall who stands up to fight against the very dark forces that want to destroy America.

Aodh P O'Beachain
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Aodh P O'Beachain
6 years ago

Cannot wait for this shambolic manufactured fake protest to end. Let these overpaid man club together and pay for therapy and prosthetic limbs for wounded vets. FBI published accurate reports of black on black murders, and how few white police killed blacks unjustly. I put it on FB yesterday.

Greg
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Greg
6 years ago

I watched an interview of a merchant selling Steeler gear and she made a remarkable statement. She said the NFL would Not be hurt because they are TOO BIG. I wonder, could this actually be the case. Her business is dead at this time and the response at her business and social media is completely negative.

We’ll see what the result is. One of the ill effects of their tantrum was teaching an Eight year old class to kneel. This will also affect the networks because if their ratings fall enough they will have to refund ad revenue.

Greg
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Greg
6 years ago

It isn’t easy is an understatement.

The “act” of kneeling is contradictory to “Tradition”. If one flaunts Tradition then it IS disrespectful.

One of the Steelers mentions:

“A lot of guys had a lot of opinions on what we should do, the idea was that we would, as an organization, stay in so that we could protect everybody,” said Foster. “The backlash, inadvertently, has still been bad but you can only imagine if guys had stepped out and did their own thing and that was what we were trying to avoid. It just didn’t come out that way.”

His remarks: “We didn’t ask for that, we didn’t ask for this whole situation.”

This created a firestorm with hundreds of negative comments and only One would try to give him the benefit of the doubt. Most of the comments centered around the team should have just went on the field and stood for the Anthem.

michaelrbuley
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michaelrbuley
6 years ago

We know Roethlisberg didn’t stand on his own beliefs.