A familiar moral panic swept the nation this week as the National Football League’s whirlwind coaching carousel came to a close.
Ten franchises — nearly a third of the league — have named new shot-callers since the end of the regular season.
Unfortunately, much of the ensuing conversation has concerned their skin color, rather than their ability to do their jobs.
The Athletic, which was acquired by The New York Times in 2022, published multiple pieces lamenting that no black coaches had been hired.
“With record-tying 10 openings, NFL teams hire zero Black head coaches,” wailed one news story.
Senior columnist Jerry Brewer argued that the teams chose “predictable dysfunction” and “organizational stagnation,” and the races of this year’s class of hires “tells you everything.”
His histrionics were regrettably representative.
“Shut out. Happy Black History Month,” mused Mike Jones, also of The Athletic.
“WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO BLACK HEAD COACHES?” raged commentator Skip Bayless, who mourned the fact that Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders would not share the same race as his new boss.
Sportswriter Mike Freeman deemed it a league “embarrassment.”
And Adam Kilgore, formerly of the now-defunct Washington Post sports section, shared a 2022 investigation into the matter in which its authors openly pined for racial “equity.”
Didn’t anyone tell these tedious, regressive bean-counters that America is over this nonsense?
Sweeping, unsubstantiated allegations of racial bias of this kind are no longer in fashion.
And they’re not coming back, no matter how much those who had come to rely on divisive DEI-speak to accrue clicks and clout might wish they would.
In truth, there’s no evidence at all that discrimination played a role in this year’s deck-shuffling.
Consider: Of the 10 teams to hire a new head coach, six have hired a black one in the past.
As for the other four, all have tapped a black general manager to oversee their roster before.
One team in that latter cohort, the Tennessee Titans, just gave Robert Saleh — a Lebanese-American Muslim who was let go by the New York Jets in 2024 after four dismal years at the helm — a second chance.
Does that sound like a league beset by bias, much less animus, to you?
And what do the doomsayers have to say about the fact that Nate Scheelhaase, the 35-year-old black passing-game coordinator for the Los Angeles Rams, finished as a finalist for the Cleveland Browns’ job despite having never been entrusted with play-calling duties?
Or that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ black coach, Todd Bowles, kept his job despite a disappointing season?
Or that the Jets are similarly standing behind Aaron Glenn, after a historically bad year even by their low standards?
NFL franchises are multibillion-dollar enterprises owned by ultra-competitive obsessives who, by and large, make decisions based on what they believe will help them on the field.
Winning games, going to the playoffs and taking home trophies doesn’t just pad their net worth; it grants them bragging rights over their peers, not to mention a legacy for which they’ll be remembered.
Status is the ultimate currency of elites, and little does more to bolster it than running a successful NFL team.
To be sure, there were a number of strong, qualified black candidates in this cycle.
Vance Joseph, Eijiro Evero and Anthony Weaver are all eminently talented coordinators with bright futures.
It appears to be a matter of when, not if, for Scheelhaase.
And the Minnesota Vikings’ Brian Flores almost certainly would have already gotten a second crack at the top job were it not for his less-than-compelling racial-discrimination lawsuit against the league (a whole ’nother story).
But the hirees included a Super Bowl champion, a two-time coach of the year and a number of young, promising schematic gurus.
With no sign at all that anyone was passed over because of their skin color, what’s the point of the garment-rending?
Neither the NFL nor America is perfect; and racial discrimination is a grave sin that ought to be condemned and confronted everywhere it’s found.
So, too, however, should those inclined to cry wolf about it.
Running down names with unfalsifiable insinuations while cherry-picking examples that lend credence to a narrative and ignoring those that dispel it does far more to hurt the cause of justice than help it.
Thankfully, Americans have resolved to reject the self-righteous, woke hall monitors — sanctimonious voices that don’t actually laud progress as much as stand in the way of it.
Isaac Schorr is a senior editor at Mediaite.