Lehner denounces Trump after taking a knee for U.S. national anthem

In case you missed it earlier this evening, Dallas Stars forwards Tyler Seguin and Jason Dickinson, as well as Vegas Golden Knights goaltender Robin Lehner and forward Ryan Reaves elected to join each other in silent protest by taking a knee during the singing of the Star Spangled Banner.

Check it out:

Regardless of your political beliefs or your thoughts on protesting, this act on behalf of Seguin, Dickinson, Lehner and Reaves sure raised eyebrows across the sporting world. Especially considering Reaves' own words about protesting the anthem just yesterday. When asked for his thoughts on protesting the anthem Reaves stated that he wouldn't ever do it because he wouldn't want to make any of his teammates "uncomfortable."

Check it out:

Well, It certainly sounds like Reaves had a second thought on things, or someone got in his ear a bit and made him see things differently. Count Lehner as another NHLer who has had a change of mind on things when it comes to politics. You may recall that Lehner was a proud Donald Trump supporter during Trump's 2016 campaign when Lehner was a member of the Buffalo Sabres. In fact, Lehner went so far as to include a Trump 2016 decal on his Sabres mask.

After nearly four years of Trump though, Lehner's had enough. He no longer supports the President, calling his support for him back in 2016 a mistake.

Check it out:

I have to say, those are some mighty big stones on Lehner for going public on this. It certainly takes more guts to do what he did and what he said today than it does to put a Trump sticker on your mask... but I digress. 

In any case, I have no problem protests like this. Does it offend me? No. Does it make me want to jump up and act though? No. Frankly, I long for the days when politics stayed in politics and didn't bleed over into other avenues of life like sports. But that's just me, I'll never judge someone for having strong feelings about it either way.

I'll admit thought that I do pine for the days when I could enjoy flipping a game on the TV without having to worry about left wing, right wing other politics but rather whose playing left and right wing on the powerplay. Ah... the good old days. Before nearly every athlete decided to use their "platform" to pipe up about their political beliefs. It's 2020 though and like most of us, I'm doing my best to be open to new ideas. I mean, if a hard headed dude like Robin Lehner can change his opinion on things, maybe I should try to be a little more open minded, no?