There is an old adage that “Those who can’t play,
coach”. Apparently, Black coach’s adage
should be “Those who can’t Head Coach, assistant coach” or better yet “Those
who Head Coach, can’t miss the playoffs or bowl games too many times or they
gonna get fired!
10 years ago the “Rooney Rule” and the “NCAA Racial
and Gender Report Card” was established to address the discriminatory practices
against Black head coaches and sport administrators. In 2002, Johnnie Cochrane and Associates
challenged the NFL to establish a rule that required teams to interview Black
head coaches when a position became available.
Named the Fritz Pollard Alliance, Cochrane’s team forced the NFL to
establish a committee, chaired by Dan Rooney to evaluate the claims set forth
against them. The result of the
committee’s investigation established the Rooney Rule. Similarly on the collegiate level, sport activist
Richard Lapchick’s The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES)
supported by the Black Coaches Association and the NCAA began to study and
report on the racial and gender representation of black coaches and
administrators which can be found on the NCAA website.
If you want to read more about these reports and
their findings, please visit these websites:
The
Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports (TIDES)
http://www.tidesport.org/
American
Constitution Society for Law and Policy
When someone tells me that a Black head coach firing
is not about race, it is clear to me that many people are still blinded by the
belief that capitalism and racial inequity are mutually exclusive. This year alone we saw the firing of Head
Coaches Mike Brown, Avery Johnson, Lovie Smith, and Romeo Crennel (Damn…Coach
Crennel watched one of his players commit suicide and they still canned the
brotha…sheesh!). When the total of Black
head coaches in the NFL and NBA combined is 17 (12 of which have been hired
within the past 2 years), losing 4 Black head coaches is about nothing less
than race! It’s the reason why people
are critical of Black films, when you have minimal representation it does not
matter that other racial groups are being represented in the same way. In cases where one race is overrepresented
and another is underrepresented it matters how they perform, period! So, if race was not a consideration in the
firing of these men, I am arguing that it should have been and in fact was!
The fact
that we are celebrating the first time two Black head coaches winning BCS title
games (Davis Shaw, Stanford and Charlie Strong, Louisville) tells me that we
still have a long way to go. Why are
winning Black coaches a reflection of the need to hire more Black head coaches? Statistically, Black head coaches are more
successful than their white counterparts.
The fact is, when Black head coaches are given the opportunity to coach,
they are successful, period! Consider
this reported by The 2012 Racial Report Card:
“Eight out of the last 12 Super
Bowl teams have had either an African-American head coach or general manager:
coaches Tony Dungy (Colts), Lovie Smith (Bears), Mike Tomlin (Steelers, twice)
and Jim Caldwell (Colts) and GMs Jerry Reese (Giants, twice) and Rod Graves
(Cardinals).”
Full disclosure, while I was disappointed to see
Lovie Smith fired by the Bears, I was glad to see Coach Frazier be successful
in Minnesota. Coach Frazier is one of
the most genuine people I met while employed with the Illinois Football
Program. I mentored his son who
demonstrated a level of respect, determination, and genuine kindness that was
clearly inherited and guided from his father.
I want to see Coach Frazier do well, not only because he is a great
Black coach but because he is a great Black man and role model! He is my real life Tony Dungy! But that’s another blog!
The Black head coaching situation is a classic case
of what I have termed Blaxspectation. You all have heard me refer to this before,
but those who are reading my blog for the first time, watch the video below as
Chris Rock explains it best!
Chris Rock on his home in New Jersey
Simply put, the reason it is always about race when
Black coaches are concerned is because it is!
Happy New Year to all my blog supporters!!
Happy New Year to all my blog supporters!!
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