Mark Purdy: “Crackback!” looks into why there are so few opportunities for black head coaches in college football
Published by the San Jose Mercury News April 29, 2012.
By Mark Purdy
I don’t know why I’m still surprised by such stories. You probably heard about the University of Arkansas debacle this month. Football coach Bobby Petrino took a motorcycle ride with his mistress, crashed and then lied about the woman, who was a university employee. So he was fired.
To many, that’s where the ignominy ended. To me, that’s where it began.
To fill Petrino’s position with spring practice underway, Arkansas promoted a bright young assistant off the Razorbacks staff, Taver Johnson, and named him interim head coach. Johnson, 36, happens to be African-American. He also seemed a good potential fit for the full-time job at Arkansas. Stanford had made virtually the same move after the 2010 season when Jim Harbaugh left and the school named eager assistant coach David Shaw, then 38 years old, as Harbaugh’s successor. Shaw then led the Cardinal to an appearance in the BCS’s Fiesta Bowl.
But what happened at Arkansas two weeks later when the school selected its coach for the 2012 season? The Razorbacks switched course and hired John L. Smith, a 63-year-old retread who was fired as Michigan State’s head coach in 2006. Smith then kicked around as a broadcaster and as a Petrino assistant before taking Weber State’s head coaching position less than five months ago — only to abruptly desert Weber State to join the Razorbacks. This is where I mention that Smith happens to be a white guy.
Did Arkansas believe Johnson was too young to become a head coach? Stanford clearly didn’t feel the same about Shaw. In an even more extreme example, the Pittsburgh Steelers hired another bright young African-American coach, Mike Tomlin, at age 34. He went on to win a Super Bowl at age 36. But all right, let’s assume Arkansas was seeking something different — an older, retread coach who had both succeeded and failed at previous college jobs. Did the school think about interviewing African-American candidates such as Ty Willingham or Denny Green? Why not?You might wonder how or why this could happen.
The answer can be found in a new book co-authored by Fitz Hill, the former San Jose State head coach, and me.
Hill, who led the SJSU program from 2001-04, was the school’s first African-American football coach. He also was outspoken in the cause of promoting minority coaching opportunities at the college level because of the unique challenges they faced. He wrote his doctoral thesis on the topic.
After leaving San Jose, Hill became president of Arkansas Baptist College. But we stayed in touch. He eventually persuaded me to help him convert his thesis into language that would engage sports fans and explain the intricacies of an issue that, owing to its racial component, too often sparks emotional reactions rather than rational dialogue.
The book — “Crackback! How College Football Blindsides The Hopes Of Black Coaches”–was published last week. And if you are wondering whether the topic is still relevant, you haven’t been paying attention. And not just to the events at Arkansas.
The NFL has made terrific strides in leveling the field for African-American coaches’ job opportunities. But the college game is still dragging behind. This season, there will be fewer black head coaches in the game’s top tier than last season. To be exact, 15 of the 120 Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly Division I) programs are led by African-Americans.
Compared to the NFL, the situation is stunning. Last season, 10 of the 32 NFL teams were coached by African-Americans. To match that percentage, colleges would need to hire 22 black head coaches today.
We called our book “Crackback!” because that’s a term for an illegal football block, one that a defender never sees coming because it comes from behind him unexpectedly. This is the same scenario encountered by African-American college coaches who believe they are properly building their résumé and positioning themselves to become head coaches — only to be suddenly knocked out of the running by an unseen force.
Is that force outright racism? The issue is actually far more complicated and layered, which is why we needed 341 pages to explain it.
“Crackback!” is written in Hill’s voice. Less than 20 percent of the content is about his experiences at San Jose State, though he does include anecdotes about a few episodes, including the time a booster suggested that Hill had made a mistake by hiring too many black assistant coaches. However, Hill’s thesis forms the book’s backbone. He surveyed or interviewed hundreds of college coaches and researched dozens of firings and hirings.
The findings of that research were fascinating. Among other things, Hill believes that a form of “black on black crime” exists in the college coaching profession because minority candidates often sabotage and backbite each other to obtain the limited jobs that seem available to them.
Meanwhile, in the Bay Area, we have a great example of what can happen when black coaches are given an opportunity. Ty Willingham and Shaw both have taken Stanford to BCS bowl games. But did you know this? They are the only two African-American coaches who have accomplished that feat. It makes you wonder why more schools have not followed Stanford’s lead.
It also makes you wonder why college football does not follow the NFL’s example, given the success by so many black coaches in the NFL after the implementation of the Rooney Rule that requires a minority candidate be interviewed for each opening. That’s how Tomlin earned his job in Pittsburgh. The Steelers gave him an interview as part of the Rooney Rule process. He knocked off their socks and got the offer. Previously, Tomlin had applied for several college jobs but couldn’t get an interview.
Hill uses “Crackback!” to lay out his own six-point proposal that would put college football on a better track toward fairness for coaches of all races. Football fans will find that proposal compelling. It would also be great for university administrators to read. You know, before another motorcycle crashes.
Contact Mark Purdy at mpurdy@mercurynews.com or 408-920-5092.