Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow became the latest American football star to express his wish to represent their countries at the Los Angeles in flag football, a sport included for 2028.
“I really want to play for the Olympic flag football team,” Burrow said during a recent appearance on the “Pardon My Take” podcast. “Like Me, Ja’marr (Chase), Justin (Jefferson), Me and my friends out there playing football. . . . I think it’d be really cool,” he was quoted as saying by CBS.
Burrow added that it would be “embarrassing” if the United States failed to win a gold medal in the first Olympics in which flag football is played.
Other players who have expressed similar interest include Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill.
A host of team sports have been added to the LA program, including cricket. But USA that prides itself on its home franchise sports, is seeing professionals from NFL wanting to join the bandwagon. NBA and NHL stars routinely ring in golds for the country, so it was expected that NFL stars would start itching to get into it, once flag football, a bonzai variant of NFL was included.
During the NFL’s annual meeting this week, commissioner Roger Goodell had insisted that the league’s players want to compete in the inaugural event. “I’ve heard directly from a lot of players who want to participate and represent their country, whether it’s United States or the country that they came from,” Goodell said.
Goodell however did not guarantee that NFL players would be permitted to participate in the 2028 Olympics, just that it was under consideration bybthe union and the league. The NFL commissioner did reiterate that he expects the league and the NFLPA to arrive on a decision soon.
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“I think that’s something that we’ll continue to discuss with, not just the union, but also the clubs,” Goodell said. “I think both of those are things that we’ll probably resolve sometime in the next 60 days.”
The NFL had enthusiastically thrown its support towards flag football prior to being picked to make its debut at the 2028 Olympics.
Goodell stressed that having flag football at the Olympics would lead to the sport growing on an international level.
USA is in a bit of its own world, since what the rest of the world calls football, is what they dub soccer, though plenty from the American continent play in the NFL.
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