Thread by @michaelharriot

For the past few weeks, America has been debating whether or not the NFL is racist because they don't hire Black head coaches. So I wondered: Could an actual economist help @theGrio answer this question?
Luckily, I know a guy.

A thread:

Of couse, the most obvious question is: How does one define racism? Is it when someone hates someone of another race? Must the definition include intent or is it the RESULT of an action or a system?

Fortunately, I found the answers in a very obscure book called a "dictionary"

Cool, so all we have to do is show that the NFL used race as a fundamental determinant in how they chose coaches, or:

That the NFL systemically oppresses one racial group to the social, economic or political advantage of another

Or that the NFL is a system founded on Racism...

Well, the last one was easy. See, in 1933, NFL teams (5 of which are still owned by the same families) banned Black players.

Of course, people would argue that the NFL stopped being racist after Black sportswriters pushed this issue and the NFL allowed Black players again.

Instead of arguing that no one wanted to watch a bunch of white boys play football, I decided to look at the hiring statistics of the NFL. And, because of my training in wypipology, I figured that people would object if I included the part of history when the NFL WAS racist.

So I decided to compare the NFL stats of Black coaches vs. white coaches AFTER 1989, when the Oakland Raiders made Art Shell the first Black head coach in the modern era.

There was one problem: The statistic didn't exist (At least I couldn't find it).

If you look closely at the racial data for the NFL (or most corporations), you'll see that it's really the data for "people of color." Nowadays, ANYONE is a "person of color." I've had a white woman from Europe argue that she is a person of color because she "didn't feel white."

FOr instance, the NFL's last occupational report says that 11 people hired since 2012 were coaches of color. While that seems abysmal, that number includes Ron Rivera, whose mother is Puerto Rican and father is Mexican. It also includes Robert Saleh, who is Lebanese American.

This doesn't mean that these groups don't experience discrimination. But in this case, it was not relevant to me because of 1 fact:

The NFL's labor force isn't 70% "people of color." 70% of the NFL's players are BLACK. I wanted to know how its coaching ranks could be so white.

So I downloaded the stats of every coach who ever coached in the NFL, but only looked at the 132 white coaches & 20 Black coaches who coached teams since 1989.

For coaches already coaching in 1989, I didn't include their stats because they were hired when the NFL WAS racist.

Now that doesn't mean that there were only 132 job openings. Some coaches were hired 2 or 3 times. I also didn't include interim coaches because they weren't technically "hired"

I wanted to know if the failures of other Black coaches were unfairly used against Black candidates

I can tell you without question that the NFL owners are NOT guilty of that kind of insipid racial stereotyping. How do I know that?

Well here is what I found:

By nearly every statistical measure, the NFL's Black coaches have outperformed white coaches.

They have a slightly lower winning percentage but they make the playoffs more often, they are more experienced when they are hired, & win slightly more games per season.

Yet despite winning as much or more than white coaches, they are usually fired before their fifth season

In a league that's 70% Black, Black coaches make up 11% of the hires since 1989.

And they're not just the 1st hired, they're the 1st fired.

A quarter of the Black men who ever coached in the NFL were fired after winning seasons. 97% of white men who did this kept their jobs.

Here's the craziest one, though: In the history of the NFL, only 12 times has a coach been fired after reaching the playoffs twice in the previous 5 years.

10 of them were Black.

In fact, the playoff appearance rate of .396 means THE AVERAGE Black coach accomplishes this.

Oh, the 2 white men weren't actually fired. In both cases, they "agreed to part on mutual terms."

1 of the reasons the overall winning percentage for white coaches is slightly higher might be that, not only do white men get to coach longer, they get 2nd & 3rd chances*

Now, you may be wondering, in a league that's 70% Black, where do they find these white boys to coach? Well, here's the thing:

If you're white, you just ask your daddy.

One of the reasons the coaching ranks are so white is because white coaches put their kids on staff.

Seriously, one-third of the NFL's current head coaches are related to a former or current head coach. The Rams coach (the youngest head coach ever) is the grandson of a former 49er GM, now led by the son of a former Broncos coach whose new head coach's dad coached for 8 teams

Maybe that's why they are young. Or maybe it's because 92% of GMs are white. Or maybe it's because–and this tripped me out–you don't even have to play in the NFL or coach in the NFL...Or college!

20% of white coaches have never played pro or college football.*

*The grafx's old

MOST Black coaches since 1989 have played in the NFL. This was admittedly easy to research since, out of the more than 10,000 Black men who played in the NFL, only 20 Black men have ever been hired to coach a team

But does this mean the NFL IS racist?

Read it for yourself:

thegrio.com/2022/02/11/bla…