On the eve of the 2021 NFL Draft, woke websites like ESPN still want us to believe that race plays a factor in which quarterbacks are taken in the draft.
On Tuesday, ESPN’s Martenzie Johnson wrote a piece titled, “Justin Fields And The Double Standard Of Black Quarterback Prospects.”
Instead of discussing the nuances of the draft process, ESPN took the easy way out — they played the race card.
“When it comes to black quarterbacks in particular,” Johnson writes, “the NFL has long gone out of its way to keep the position as white as the painted yard lines on the field.”
To kickoff the 2020 NFL season, there were a record 10 black quarterbacks to start behind center. It’s a far cry from the days in which black quarterbacks were rarely chosen to play the position. The NFL — and America — has come a long way, but according to ESPN, black quarterbacks still face an uphill battle.
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The Daily Wire spoke with Jack Brewer, former NFL player turned professor, entrepreneur, and founder of The Jack Brewer Foundation, a non-profit combating poverty and human rights abuses worldwide.
DAILY WIRE: ESPN ran an article on Justin Fields and how he’s dropping in the draft. The claim is that this drop is due to the fact that he’s a black quarterback. Do you think it’s still a problem in the NFL? We see so many black quarterbacks in the NFL today, but what are your thoughts on it?
BREWER: That one is hard for me to swallow because I know growing up, when I grew up and playing football and through the eighties and high school in the nineties, if you were fast — particularly black kids that could run — they weren’t letting you play quarterback. You were playing receiver or running back. So we were 100% denied opportunities, that generation. And so when you look at quarterbacks now, you got to look at the generation in which they grew up in. Today, I can’t tell you that my black son is going to have less ability because he’s black in American society. Now, my dad definitely had less abilities and different things, but at some point you can break through those barriers. And right now, looking at everything from college football to pro football and the way that the players that you see playing in the leagues and the schemes that they’re running, it will be very hard for someone to tell me that because of someone’s color of their skin, that they aren’t getting an opportunity in football – a sport that I think has 78% blackness.
And a lot of quarterbacks — 10? 10 starters. Now, if the white starters weren’t performing, but there were some pretty good white quarterbacks too. You know what I’m saying? Football ain’t a place where you hide behind race. Like you either make plays or you don’t. There’s no hiding. So, I don’t buy that right now. I think that’s gonna hurt the game if they keep doing it, because we fought so hard. My generation and generations before fought so hard for equality, that if we allow us to hold on to that, and we don’t give credit where credit is due and speak truth, they can come back and hurt us. But I just don’t see that.
DAILY WIRE: I agree and I think it’s pretty straightforward. But I do think there is more work that needs to be done.
BREWER: Yeah, there is. I mean, if you talk about coaching opportunities, there may be some of that. If you talk about the front office — I can’t comment on that because I’m not as knowledgeable on it — but pure players in any position in the NFL? Pick them up. Pure players, it’s hard for me to say that. You got too many tests, and if you got a dude that’s super intelligent, that has the skills and makes the throws, and has shown everything else, you be hard to tell me that in this day and age, that somebody is still worried about the color of their skin.
You went from Russell Wilson, to Lamar Jackson, you got players that are just the cream of the crop. People want that to be the case at this point. That’s what’s sad, is it gets to the point where people want oppression to exist. It’s like they’re wishing it into existence. It’s terrible.
Joe Morgan is the Sports Reporter for The Daily Wire. Most recently, Morgan covered the Clippers, Lakers and the NBA for Sporting News.
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.