ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — Are you already tired of the ongoing controversy over NFL players protesting police brutality and racial inequality in America during the national anthem?

Me too.

Since our president’s rant last Friday in Alabama, a subject that had become a footnote since it was introduced by former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick in last year’s preseason, it has dominated the news cycle for six days at the expense of certified national hot-button issues such as health care, tax reform, North Korea and Puerto Rico.

Thus, in yesterday’s media interviews, coach Sean McDermott and virtually every player were asked how the Bills planned to “protest” before Sunday’s game in Atlanta.

The whole issue has taken on a life of its own.

It’s become axiomatic that Donald Trump’s popularity rating has hovered in the mid-30 percent range  since his inauguration. But when he maintained at the rally in Huntsville that players were disrespecting the flag, military and country by protesting during the Star Spangled Banner, he hit on a subject over which the country is pretty much evenly divided.

It’s true in my own house.

My wife feels demonstrating players are disrespectful and ungrateful. I maintain they have a right to peacefully protest issues that a league, which is 70 percent black, can easily identify with. But I’m no more right than she is.

Admittedly, my position changed from when Kaepernick sat, without fanfare, during the anthem at that San Francisco exhibition game.

In my mind, he was showing disrespect.

But within days, a former NFL long-snapper who was also a member of the special forces, conferred with him and explained that a more effective approach would be to take a knee, simultaneously honoring the flag and the military but also offering a silent protest.

Once Kaepernick took that advice, I was fine with his demonstrations, which received limited support from his fellow players, and had pretty much disappeared as a story until Trump’s tirade.

And, before you ask, unlike our President, I served in the military as a Navy communications officer during the Vietnam War.

As with the general population, though, veterans are split on the issue.

What’s certain is, the disagreement continues with no sign of going away.

Never has so much attention been paid to the national anthem before a Bills game than Sunday at New Era Field.

And, full disclosure, I had my own moment of aggravation.

My binoculars were at-the-ready as the Bills players and coaches walked out on the field, arm-and-arm, about a dozen of them choosing to kneel. The Broncos stayed on the sideline, also with locked arms, about half of them taking a knee.

But as Abby Anderson sang the anthem, accompanying herself on the piano, I spotted Buffalo running back LeSean McCoy stretching. My inclination was to give him the cliched “benefit of the doubt” thinking maybe he had a cramp. But when he finally joined his kneeling teammates, it was clear that wasn’t the case, and  he had merely chosen to make the demonstration all about him.

It was undeniably disrespectful, not only to the flag, military and anthem, but also to his teammates who have conviction about the real purpose of the protest.

Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly was also on the field with the team, holding up his left arm with a Bills’ hat in hand. And, the next morning during a radio interview, he called out McCoy for stretching.

Kelly’s criticism was well-received, but after linebacker Jerry Hughes complained about the comments, he unfortunately backed off his stance.

Since then, Kelly has made peace with both McCoy and Hughes.

On Wednesday, the running back was asked about his interaction with Kelly.

“I texted him … he said some things to the media that he probably could’ve said to me, but (it’s) his opinion,” McCoy said. “ It doesn’t really matter to me. I like Jim Kelly. He texted me and I just told him, ‘Hey, you’re human. People have their own opinions. What you said, you don’t have to apologize for it. I don’t think you’re wrong. That’s how you felt, I understand. My respect for you hasn’t changed. It’s still very high.’

“It didn’t affect me at all. Opinions about good or bad, football-wise or outside of football, it wouldn’t matter to me as far as him as a person because that’s his opinion.”

But why did McCoy choose stretching during the anthem as his vehicle of protest, when his teammates were already part of one.

“I was extremely hurt, to be honest. People believe in different things. They stand up for whatever they want. That’s their right,” he said. “Some of the words that the President used, it just rubbed me the wrong way.  I was upset and frustrated and that’s the way I wanted to express myself at the game. I took a knee, I started stretching, I was angry.

“Like I said after the game, someone like the President … being our leader of this country, in front of millions and millions of people, seeing the type of words and things he’s saying about us, it just got to me.”

McCoy made it clear he had no regrets and would do the same thing in hindsight.

As for this Sunday against the Falcons, he added,  “I haven’t thought about that. That was last week. If you see around the whole NFL, (players) kind of took the President’s words and really expressed themselves. Some teams didn’t even come out for the national anthem. Guys were just extremely hurt, like myself. This week, we really want to get back to just playing football and focus in.

“Every week will be different. We’re a football team. We talk about being together as a country, and that’s the same thing with this team.  It’s OK to express your feelings in a different way, but I don’t want to make it where every week we’re addressing this (or) every practice we’re addressing this, taking away from our job.”

We can only hope … but don’t count on it this week.

(Chuck Pollock, a Times Herald sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)