49ers’ George Kittle Lets Canadians Know What He Thinks of Booing the Anthem

NFL players have a checkered past regarding the national anthem, but it’s nice when one of them is on the right side of a controversy over the Star-Spangled Banner.

On Saturday night, Canadian fans in attendance for the 4 Nations Face-Off clash between the U.S. and Canada did what they have been doing for the past several weeks: they booed the U.S. national anthem.

What resulted was three glove-dropping brawls within nine seconds of the puck drop and hard-hitting throughout the game.

The Americans won the game, 3-1. Ensuring that the booing Canadian fans would boo at the start and end of the game. Team USA’s spirited defense of the anthem prompted 49ers star tight end George Kittle to post “Don’t boo the anthem!” on Instagram along with the final score.

Matthew Tkachuk and Canada’s Brandon Hagel were the first to drop the gloves.

Next up, Brady Tkachuk took on Canada’s Sam Bennett.

After the Tkachuk brothers let the crowd know the Americans came to play, it seemed like the two sides would actually start playing hockey. They did, for about four seconds, until J.T. Miller gave a shot to Canada’s Colton Parayko a shot, and the gloves came off again.

After the two opening rounds of fisticuffs, it seemed like the two sides would actually start playing hockey. They did, for about four seconds, until J.T. Miller gave a shot to Canada’s Colton Parayko a shot, and the gloves came off again.

“We knew it was going to happen,” U.S. defenseman Zach Werenski said of the booing of the anthem. “It happened the last game. It’s been happening in the NHL before this, and we knew tonight was going to be the same way. We obviously don’t like it.

“It is what it is,” Werenski continued. “We kind of had an idea. We used it as motivation the best we could and found a way to get a win. But we had an idea going into it, so it wasn’t a surprise. Definitely don’t like it, though.”