AteUp
09-19-2007, 12:46 AM
Two arguments from differing sides and colors. Personally, I couldn't care less what color the players are on my favorite teams.
http://cbs.sportsline.com/columns/story/10359486/1
McNabb pulling the race card? How ironic ... and ridiculous
Sep. 18, 2007
By Gregg Doyel
CBSSports.com National Columnist
http://images.sportsline.com/images/author/8450.jpg
Black quarterbacks look the same to me. Every last one looks like a guy who should be playing running back. Or defensive back. Or receiver. They look like anything but a quarterback, which used to be an all-white position and should have stayed that way.
Right, Donovan McNabb? That's what you think I'm thinking. That's what you think lots of people are thinking. We don't like black quarterbacks -- never have, never will. So implies McNabb, who went on HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on Tuesday night and slapped the race card on the table.
The Eagles' McNabb said: "There's not that many African-American quarterbacks, so we have to do a little bit extra. ... Because the percentage of us playing this position, which people didn't want us to play this position, is low, so we do a little extra."
And McNabb said: "I pass for 300 yards, our team wins by seven (and critics say), 'Ah, he could've made this throw, they would have scored if he did this.' "
And of white Carson Palmer and Peyton Manning, McNabb said: "Let me start by saying I love those guys. But they don't get criticized as much as we do. They don't."
Granted, McNabb has reasons to be bitter. He plays in a vicious sports city where some of the dumber citizens have probably said racist things to him over the years. He was once attacked clumsily by Rush Limbaugh, who said McNabb was overrated but protected by media that "has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well."
Limbaugh is the living, breathing, lying, painkilling proof of the difference between sounding smart and being smart. He talks fast and uses big words and can lead a group of lemmings over a cliff more effectively than George Wallace ever could.
But Limbaugh isn't smart. Can't be. To say what he said about McNabb in 2003, when McNabb was a dominant quarterback, was stupid. Limbaugh paid for it by losing his side gig with ESPN. America -- black America, white America, our America -- didn't tolerate his racial stupidity.
So why are we going to tolerate racial stupidity coming now from McNabb? Toleration in the name of entertainment allowed racist blowhards like Limbaugh and Don Imus to spew invective over the airwaves. But toleration in the name of political correctness has allowed white-bashing demagogues like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson Sr. to inflame racially sensitive cases like the ones starring Tawana Brawley and Duke lacrosse.
You go ahead -- tolerate McNabb's comments. Or be like my colleague Mike Freeman and embrace McNabb's social commentary. Me, I'm calling McNabb on it. I'm calling it stupid. I'm calling it intellectually lazy. And I'm calling it cowardly.
His career is sinking, and instead of facing it head on, he pulled out that big, ugly race card and tried to hide his decade-worst 68.8 passer rating behind it.
McNabb is myopic. He thinks he has it rough? Try being Rex Grossman, the quarterback of the Chicago Bears, who gets ripped even as he is leading the Bears to the Super Bowl. The next two most critiqued quarterbacks in the NFL are probably the Jets' Chad Pennington and the Giants' Eli Manning. All three are white.
McNabb? He's old and fading, and judging from his HBO appearance, he's not taking it very well. In his own city, columnist John Smallwood called out McNabb in the Philadelphia Daily News on Tuesday. McNabb, Smallwood wrote, "is like a batter with warning-track power." The old McNabb "is gone." This McNabb "looks bad."
Will McNabb call Smallwood a racist? That would be ironic. Smallwood is black.
McNabb? He's weak. He says black quarterbacks have it rougher than white quarterbacks, and he says it in a way that makes my skin crawl: "They don't get criticized as much as we do."
Lovely. How nice and segregating. And how ridiculous. If it's so much more difficult being a black quarterback than a white one -- please stop chuckling, Grossman -- McNabb has to give us examples. Don't just sit there and say that nonsense with a smirk and assume we're going to nod along, because lots of us won't. Not any more.
Enough is enough. This isn't the 1970s, when Tony Dungy was moved to defensive back without getting a chance behind center, and when Warren Moon was having to start his Hall of Fame career in Canada.
This is 2007, and NFL teams and their fans just want to win. In Oakland, the Raiders have a white starting quarterback, Josh McCown, but a fan base that would prefer Daunte Culpepper or JaMarcus Russell, both black. The Raiders drafted Russell No. 1 overall instead of the other quarterback who ended his senior season presumed to be the likely first pick, Brady Quinn.
How far has the NFL come? The three cities with the largest redneck population -- I'm from Mississippi; I'm allowed -- employ black quarterbacks: In Jacksonville, the Jaguars had three black quarterbacks until releasing Byron Leftwich a few weeks ago. In Nashville, Vince Young is the franchise. And in Atlanta, the Falcons gave Michael Vick the biggest contract in NFL history and stood by him through several embarrassing off-field mistakes until he was charged with felony dogfighting. Joey Harrington replaced Vick, but on Tuesday the Falcons brought in Leftwich to compete for the starting job.
Teams no longer care about skin color. It's all about wins and losses, and if there's one color that transcends all others, it's green. In 2004, three of the four biggest contracts in the NFL went to black quarterbacks.
McNabb came in second at $115 million.
Must be awful to be that guy.
http://cbs.sportsline.com/columns/story/10359486/1
McNabb pulling the race card? How ironic ... and ridiculous
Sep. 18, 2007
By Gregg Doyel
CBSSports.com National Columnist
http://images.sportsline.com/images/author/8450.jpg
Black quarterbacks look the same to me. Every last one looks like a guy who should be playing running back. Or defensive back. Or receiver. They look like anything but a quarterback, which used to be an all-white position and should have stayed that way.
Right, Donovan McNabb? That's what you think I'm thinking. That's what you think lots of people are thinking. We don't like black quarterbacks -- never have, never will. So implies McNabb, who went on HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel on Tuesday night and slapped the race card on the table.
The Eagles' McNabb said: "There's not that many African-American quarterbacks, so we have to do a little bit extra. ... Because the percentage of us playing this position, which people didn't want us to play this position, is low, so we do a little extra."
And McNabb said: "I pass for 300 yards, our team wins by seven (and critics say), 'Ah, he could've made this throw, they would have scored if he did this.' "
And of white Carson Palmer and Peyton Manning, McNabb said: "Let me start by saying I love those guys. But they don't get criticized as much as we do. They don't."
Granted, McNabb has reasons to be bitter. He plays in a vicious sports city where some of the dumber citizens have probably said racist things to him over the years. He was once attacked clumsily by Rush Limbaugh, who said McNabb was overrated but protected by media that "has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well."
Limbaugh is the living, breathing, lying, painkilling proof of the difference between sounding smart and being smart. He talks fast and uses big words and can lead a group of lemmings over a cliff more effectively than George Wallace ever could.
But Limbaugh isn't smart. Can't be. To say what he said about McNabb in 2003, when McNabb was a dominant quarterback, was stupid. Limbaugh paid for it by losing his side gig with ESPN. America -- black America, white America, our America -- didn't tolerate his racial stupidity.
So why are we going to tolerate racial stupidity coming now from McNabb? Toleration in the name of entertainment allowed racist blowhards like Limbaugh and Don Imus to spew invective over the airwaves. But toleration in the name of political correctness has allowed white-bashing demagogues like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson Sr. to inflame racially sensitive cases like the ones starring Tawana Brawley and Duke lacrosse.
You go ahead -- tolerate McNabb's comments. Or be like my colleague Mike Freeman and embrace McNabb's social commentary. Me, I'm calling McNabb on it. I'm calling it stupid. I'm calling it intellectually lazy. And I'm calling it cowardly.
His career is sinking, and instead of facing it head on, he pulled out that big, ugly race card and tried to hide his decade-worst 68.8 passer rating behind it.
McNabb is myopic. He thinks he has it rough? Try being Rex Grossman, the quarterback of the Chicago Bears, who gets ripped even as he is leading the Bears to the Super Bowl. The next two most critiqued quarterbacks in the NFL are probably the Jets' Chad Pennington and the Giants' Eli Manning. All three are white.
McNabb? He's old and fading, and judging from his HBO appearance, he's not taking it very well. In his own city, columnist John Smallwood called out McNabb in the Philadelphia Daily News on Tuesday. McNabb, Smallwood wrote, "is like a batter with warning-track power." The old McNabb "is gone." This McNabb "looks bad."
Will McNabb call Smallwood a racist? That would be ironic. Smallwood is black.
McNabb? He's weak. He says black quarterbacks have it rougher than white quarterbacks, and he says it in a way that makes my skin crawl: "They don't get criticized as much as we do."
Lovely. How nice and segregating. And how ridiculous. If it's so much more difficult being a black quarterback than a white one -- please stop chuckling, Grossman -- McNabb has to give us examples. Don't just sit there and say that nonsense with a smirk and assume we're going to nod along, because lots of us won't. Not any more.
Enough is enough. This isn't the 1970s, when Tony Dungy was moved to defensive back without getting a chance behind center, and when Warren Moon was having to start his Hall of Fame career in Canada.
This is 2007, and NFL teams and their fans just want to win. In Oakland, the Raiders have a white starting quarterback, Josh McCown, but a fan base that would prefer Daunte Culpepper or JaMarcus Russell, both black. The Raiders drafted Russell No. 1 overall instead of the other quarterback who ended his senior season presumed to be the likely first pick, Brady Quinn.
How far has the NFL come? The three cities with the largest redneck population -- I'm from Mississippi; I'm allowed -- employ black quarterbacks: In Jacksonville, the Jaguars had three black quarterbacks until releasing Byron Leftwich a few weeks ago. In Nashville, Vince Young is the franchise. And in Atlanta, the Falcons gave Michael Vick the biggest contract in NFL history and stood by him through several embarrassing off-field mistakes until he was charged with felony dogfighting. Joey Harrington replaced Vick, but on Tuesday the Falcons brought in Leftwich to compete for the starting job.
Teams no longer care about skin color. It's all about wins and losses, and if there's one color that transcends all others, it's green. In 2004, three of the four biggest contracts in the NFL went to black quarterbacks.
McNabb came in second at $115 million.
Must be awful to be that guy.