Black Players Star On The Field As Black Coaches Struggle For Opportunity

With football season just around the corner, many young men will gear up to fulfill their dream of making it all the way to the NFL. However, while the NFL and NBA often appear as examples of successful integration, the numbers of black coaches in pro and college sports are not often in line with the number of players on the field. According to a 2008 ESPN article on black coaches, while 53 percent of college athletes are African-American, only four coaches out of the 119 teams in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision were black.

James Taylor, CEO of Taylored Athletes, a company that provides training to developing basketball players, says the numbers are increasing in football and basketball, but there is still a lot of room for improvement. All other sports appear dominated by white male coaches, Taylor adds.

Taylor, who played basketball at the high school, college, and professional level, says the number one problem facing black coaches are the education requirements.

He says many young black men gear their goals towards making it as players, and often ignore their education, which means the schools are also failing in their educational responsibilities. Statistics show that many black athletes do not graduate from college programs. A 2006 NCAA study, authored by Richard Lapchick, showed how the graduation rate for football players was 55 percent, while the rate of graduating basketball players was 46 percent.

This sets black players up to fail, if they want to transition to coaching positions.

“They don’t have the academic requirements to be placed in a coaching position,” Taylor says.

He adds that many societal factors push young black players into becoming players rather than coaches, such as the fame and huge financial rewards, but that it is the coaches who actually are more important in the long-run because they control the scholarships and who plays in a certain position.

Taylor says that coaches have an important role to play in the African-American community as well because of their influence over these young black men, who often come from fatherless homes.

College players also need to be aware of the brutal reality of making it all the way to the top. According to figures provided by the Hartford Financial Game Plan Survey, only one percent of college athletes make it to the pro level.

“Young black athletes need to understand that sports are a vehicle that can get you to a different place, but it is not the only vehicle,” Taylor said. “I would like to see the NFL, the NBA, and sports companies such as Nike invest more in coaching programs, and not just player development programs.”

Fred Hickman, a veteran sports caster who has worked for CNN, TBS, the YES Network, and ESPN, thinks the NBA is doing a good job of creating a pipeline of African-American coaches. Hickman, who currently covers the Atlanta Braves for FOX Sports South, says many basketball coaches get their feet in the door as assistant coaches, and use that as a method to move up the ladder. However, Hickman says, “College football and the NFL have a long way to go.”

According to Hickman, black coaches face systemic problems that go all the way down to the college level. “The typical explanation (for not hiring a black coach) is that teams do not have a body of minority candidates to hire from.”

Hickman says this is like the chicken and the egg problem, because if black coaches cannot get a foothold in head college positions, it makes it tough to get high-level professional positions.

Black coaches and players still face perceptions that they are not capable of taking on leadership roles. “Some people think we are not capable of thinking, researching, and leading a football team,” Hickman adds.

He says there is a type of disconnect between the playing ranks and the people being hired to lead the college and pro teams. “With the wealth of talent, (coming from the players) why don’t you have more people coaching at the top level?” Hickman asks.

Hickman adds that he often notices that black coaches have a tougher time getting positions, while other coaches, who have blatantly broken the law, and ran programs in to the ground are still being hired. “Black coaches need to be given the time to prove themselves. You have to give them time to build their programs.”

According to Hickman, the NFL made an important step to opening the doors to black coaches, when it implemented the “Rooney Rule,” which mandates that teams must interview African-American coaches for open positions.

Hickman cites Tony Dungy, who coached the Indianapolis Colts to a Super Bowl victory in 2007, as a great example of what black coaches can do if given the opportunity. Hickman says that Dungy has proven that black men can overcome any obstacle they face and succeed at the highest level.

“I am a huge Tony Dungy fan,” Hickman said. “Tony is a trailblazer in the process.”