In Black America; The Fritz Pollard Awards

From the University of Texas at Austin, KUT Radio, this is In Black America. My work explores historically the challenges that people of color face in terms of getting leadership positions in the league, both playing, but also in the coaching and administrative positions. As you mentioned, John, my book's called Advanced in the Ball, it basically traces the history of the challenges that have gotten us to where we are, a situation where we've had in the last five years, an extraordinary number of people of color, both coaches and GMs in the Super Bowl. This year, in fact, we've got Jerry Reese with New York Giants. We expect him to have a great day on Sunday. He's won one Super Bowl already and it shows that the myth of African-Americans being unable to take the highest level intellectual positions and do good things with them is crumbles away.

And so I'm really proud of Jerry. We hope that he has a great day on Sunday, John. Jeremy Duru, counsel to the Fritz-Polica Lions Foundation and author of Advancing in the Ball. On February 2nd, 2006, one of the most significant and unpublished sides of the event during Super Bowl 40 week was the inaugural Fritz-Polica Lions Salute to Excellence Awards. NFL head coaches Tony Dungee with the Indianapolis Coates, Lubby Smith with the Chicago Bears and Marvin Lewis with the Cincinnati Bengals were honored with the Johnny L. Cocker and Jr. Salute to Excellence Award at the Star-Sturder event at the State Theater in downtown Detroit. It was appropriate to name the award after late Johnny Cocker since he and Cyrus Mary issued a groundbreaking report, Black coaches in the National Football League, Superior Performance and Figure Opportunities, which has been the foundation of hiring changes in the NFL. This report led to the implementation of the Rooney Rule, which requires NFL teams to

interview a minority candidate for head coaching and senior football operation opportunities. I'm Johnny L. Hanson Jr. and welcome to another edition of In Black America. On this week's program, the 7th annual Johnny L. Cocker and Jr. Salute to Excellence Awards in Black America. I would say the most important thing was that I knew there were a lot of coaches out there who were very good outstanding men and they weren't being recognized and I had read Colin Powell earlier at some point where he said that equal performance but unequal opportunity which includes unequal advancement is not a fair system. So I think, you know, like I said, there were lots of factors but the fact that those men were out there and only a couple of them, Dennis Greene and Ray Rose, had gotten the kind of opportunities that I think all football people knew they needed and let

me to believe it was time to kick the mule a little bit. For decades, the National Football League had been a colossal embarrassment from an equal employment opportunity perspective. Between 1926 and the start of the 1989 season, the league featured no African American head coaches and in the decade that followed it featured only a few. Neither the National Basketball Association nor Major League Baseball had been nearly a historically homogenous in this respect and by the turn of the century, both leagues were leading the head of the NFL in terms of diversity and off-the-field and off-the-court positions. In 2002, however, two lawyers, Cyrus Mary and the late Johnny El Cochrane juniors, together with a few NFL veterans, began a movement that would expand opportunities or coaches of color in the NFL and ultimately transform the league's racial landscape. The movement began with the University of Pennsylvania economics professor's statistical

analysis, which revealed that few African Americans who obtained NFL head coaching positions performed more effectively than their white counterparts, but nonetheless had fewer opportunities to apply their trade. In Black America, spoke with Jeremy Duru before the awards ceremony. My work explores historically the challenges the people of color faced in terms of getting leadership positions in the league, both playing, but also in the coaching and administrative positions. As you mentioned, John, my book's called The Vance N' Ball. It basically traces the history of the challenges that have gotten us to where we are, a situation where we've had in the last five years, an extraordinary number of people of color, both coaches and GMs in the Super Bowl. This year, in fact, we've got Jerry Reese with New York Giants. We expect him to have a great day on Sunday. He's won one Super Bowl already and it shows that the myth of African Americans being unable to take the highest level intellectual positions and do good things with them is crumbles away.

And so we're really proud of Jerry. We hope that he has a great day on Sunday, John. It's Mike Tomlum, the direct resource of what John Wooden and Cyrus Mary and the late Johnny Cochrane put together that Rooney Role. I think it's some ways, yes. I mean, Mike is an incredible guy and he's incredibly articulate, he's got incredible presence. If you're ever in the room with Mike, you'll know that he's in the room, a brilliant guy. So he was a tremendous candidate to begin with. But by his own admission, had it not been for this movement, this movement that you mentioned created by Cyrus Mary and John Wooden and Johnny Cochrane, or not for this movement. He would not have had the opportunity he did to be a head coach with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He wouldn't have gotten that interview, probably, wouldn't have had the opportunity. With the interview, he took the opportunity, got the job, spent the two Super Bowls 1-1. We lost three Black head coaches this season. Do you think the rule is going to come in effect?

One of the teams may replace or have a Black head coach. I think, I don't think so. I think that those positions have been filled or will be filled with non-minority coaches. But every team went through the process that you have to go through. What we found in the past is that it's often the case that teams will go through that process. They might not the first time around select that coach of color. But the next time they've got an opening, that person's so impressed them, they'll bring him in, or they'll say, hey, my fellow owner at So-and-So franchise, I didn't select this guy because I wanted the offensive guy or whatever. I wanted a defensive guy, so he didn't quite fit, but he was a tremendous. You think about it. And then the other coach picks the person up. A lot of people of this generation think Art Schill was the first African-American Black coach that we're here at the Fritz Pollock function here in Indianapolis. Give us a thumbnail here to see a Fritz Pollock. Sure. So Fritz Pollock was a tremendous athlete coming out of the Midwest, went to Brown University, played football, my alma mater, actually, took Brown to its first and only Rose Bill.

It was a tremendous player there. When he left Brown, he played for the Akron Probe, a team in the league. There was a predecessor league of the NFL. And the second season, he was not only played, but he became a co-head coach. So he was the first head coach of color in the National Football League. Now, the sad part of the story is that shortly after a gentleman's agreement pushed all of the Black folks out of the National Football League, they didn't come back into the league until 1946 when they were allowed back in. Fritz Pollock, by the way, was a coach in 1921. So you see how much time passed before they were left back in, and we didn't have our first head coach in the modern era until Art Schill, basically 60 years after Fritz Pollock was head coach. And Paul Tagaloo is going to be honored this evening when I get the first Fritz Pollock leadership award. His contribution to the upper mobility of African-Americans within the coaching ranks for the NFL. Yeah, he was always quite committed to, based on my research, quite committed to increasing

the proportion of people of color in the league on the coaching and front level, front and office levels. But he never really had the opportunity, he couldn't get the mechanism to do it. So when this mechanism was introduced to him by Cyrus Mary and Johnny Cochland, he seized on it. With some help of his general counsel and some others in the league, he seized on it and embraced it. And he put together a committee, Dan, when he was the chair of the committee, and said, hey, you guys find a way to diversify our head coach in ranks. So he put the train in motion, and that train has taken us to where we are now. So he does deserve a lot of credit for not being afraid to stand up and say that this rule is something we need, and perhaps more importantly, even the net, he stood up and find the Detroit Lions $200,000 when they didn't follow the rule some years back, and said anybody else would be fine, half a million.

And since then, we've had pretty strong compliance with the rule. You mentioned Ambassador Rooney, how important or clever, Taco Bell was of selecting an individual of his statue to actually lead the committee. Yeah, no, he knew what he was doing. And what's funny about that, John, is John, who in the chair of this of the first part of the line, told me that when he got the call, the Dan Rooney was going to be the chair of the committee, he said at that point, he knew that we won, and I have that in my book. He says, at that point, I knew that there were coming time when somebody would have to lead, be out there in front to make sure that this rule is something that's respected, and Dan Rooney is a person to do it. So at that point, he felt that we won. Jeremy Duhruh, counseled to the Fritz-Polica Lions Foundation, an author of Advancing to Ball. Super Bowl 46 had many events, but one in particular, brought everyone together to celebrate diversity in the NFL leadership, and one of those who diligently worked to make it a reality.

The Fritz-Polica Lions Awards ceremony, Paul Tagler-Blue slurred the NFL Commissioner for 17 years. From 1989 until he retired from the position in 2006, he presided over the greatest period of growth and success of the game in the history of the National Football League. During his tenure, the league grew from 28 to 32 teams, secured the largest television contracts in entertainment history, supported the construction of more than 20 NFL teams stadiums, and expanded the NFL's global reach. Also as NFL Commissioner, he was more focused on advancing the role of African Americans in coaching in leadership positions than any other commissioner in the history of the NFL. Well, it's really incredibly important, because what the Fritz-Polica Lions' address goes so far beyond winning and losing games that goes to our soul as a nation, really, as a people, and to be honored for helping promote opportunity and diversity and the values that underlie those priorities in our society is really, really, very, very important to

me, and I'm deeply appreciative. What convinced you at the time when late Johnny Cockman Jr., and Cyrus Mary came to you with this statistical analysis of what was going on in the league, and you figured out that something needed to change? Well, you know, it was a lot of things, but I would say the most important thing was that I knew there were a lot of coaches out there who were very good outstanding men, and they weren't being recognized. And I had read Colin Powell earlier at some point where he said that equal performance, that unequal opportunity, which includes unequal advancement, is not a fair system. So I think, you know, like I said, there were lots of factors, but the fact that those men were out there, and only a couple of them, Dennis Greene and Ray Rose, had gotten the kind of opportunities that, I think all football people knew they needed, and let

me to believe it was time to kick the mule a little bit. What was it about, and that's the real thing that made you more convinced that he could get the job done? Well, you know, I'd known him since 1970, and I knew the history of the Steelers through the 70s with Mel Blunt and all those great players, and those great teams, and Lynn Swan and so forth. But more than that, when I became commissioner, he immediately started talking to me about opportunity for African Americans being a high priority. And at one point in the early 90s, just to take one specific example, when Tony Dongey was a defensive coordinator with the Vikings, and he was frustrated in terms of opportunity, or lack of opportunity, he was getting to move up to the head coaching position, Dan called me up and said, why don't you bring him in and make him an executive in the league office?

Because he said, this guy can do anything. He could do any job in football, so, and he said, right now he's frustrated, he came and worked for you for a couple of years. I called Tony up, said, you want to get out of the frustration, come over here and work in New York, and then go back into the coaching hunt, you know. And he called me back and he said, commissioner, I appreciate the offer, but I'm a football guy, not a suit guy. And so he said, I want to stay where I am and I'll keep, you know, banging away. So those were the kinds of things that Dan would do on repeated occasions, you know. And so he, that's what led me to think that he had, I didn't have to motivate him, he was already motivated, and he also had great credibility. And of course, we put on the committee other people that were like-minded, you know, some of them were younger, like Pat Bowling and Jeff Lurie, they were like-minded people. Paul Taglibu, former NFL commissioner, and the first recipient of the Paul J. Taglibu

Award from the Fritz Pondicle Lions Foundation. Six African-American top executive NFL teams and two African-American head coaches were honored at an event during Super Bowl 46 week in Indianapolis. The Fritz Pondicle Lions Foundation honored these trailblazers at the 7th annual Johnny L. Cochran Jr. salute to excellent awards. One of those honorable Jerry Rees, General Manager of the New York Giants. Reese is in his fifth season as the Giants Senior Vice President and General Manager. He is one of the most successful General Managers in the NFL. His first four seasons as head of the franchise's football operations include a 40-in-24 regular season record, a 4-in-1 postseason mark, and victory in Super Bowl 42. One NFC East Championship and no season with the Giants finished under 500. When Reese was hired as the General Manager for the New York Giants on January 16, 2007, he had been with the organization since 1994.

In his first draft as GM of the Giants, seven of his eight-pissed contributed immediately and helped build the Giants into a Super Bowl team. He was one of only three African-American General Managers in the league at the time. Jerry, how important was you to be selected as a recipient of the Fritz Pond Award this evening? Well, the thing about the Fritz Pondicle Lions, you know, it keeps everybody in tune with the struggle, you know, and it's truly been a struggle, and I don't take it lightly to be in the position that I'm in right now because truly many people have suffered so I can be in this position, and, you know, it's my time to carry the torch, so to speak. And I don't take that lightly, and I want to leave it better than it was made for me. So that's my role right now. I embrace that, and I'm looking forward to, you know, Sunday we got a great opportunity on Sunday.

We're playing against a terrific football team and the Patriots, but I like our chances and hopefully we can come out with a win. Starting out in the Sky and the Department, was it ever your aspiration to come to you? It was. You know, I wanted to work my way up, but, you know, as a young scout, I was just, you know, sitting in the back of the room, reading my reports and absorbing everything, just like a sponge that I could, you know, I can absorb from George Young and a great young and a great earning a coursey, you know, two great mentors for me. And so I was there just waiting for my opportunity, working hard, keeping my head down, and, you know, got an opportunity. It's great, but grateful to the Giants for the opportunity. In reading your background, you talked about due diligence and working and doing what's necessary to draft players, particularly Anne Rogers, your number one pick. How much effort and homework goes into those decisions when you're approaching and on draft day? Well, it's a big project. The draft is a big project and the thing about the draft, it's not science, you know,

and you're not going to get everything right. You want to get more right than you get wrong. So when you draft, you know, you got to have some background and after a while, you have a good feeling on guys and sometimes the guy looks like a duck, well, like a duck, crack like a duck, and you get him out there that's not a duck. So that's an in-adjac science, and again, what's with the Giants? We try to get more right than we get wrong. What did you see in Eli Manning? Well, Eli is, you know, the number one thing we liked about Eli was his toughness, his mental makeup, and he made people around him better, you know, he made his receivers better, he made his running backs better, he made his offensive line better, so he made people around him better, and he's still doing that today with our football team. You're in the major metropolitan media center of the country. Is that an extra spotlight on USGM? Well, you know, it's a challenge there because, you know, everything is scrutinized and probably a little bit over-scrutinized and a little bit over-sensationalized, but you know, it comes through the territory, you know, I relish that, and, you know, I have

a good group of people working around me, and, you know, a lot of hard workers are, you know, our players work hard, our coaches work hard, our front office, you know, and we're all a family, and it's all about what we do together to get to where we are right now. What headaches and taxing the surge you had since the labor agreement took so long to take place, and, you know, you got training camp coming up, and you got an organization to run. Well, you know, there's a lot of things. We had lots of meetings because we had nothing else to do with me, so we were prepared when we came out of the lockout, and we hit the ground running really quickly, and to get our team up and running, get training camp going, and it was a abbreviated preseason, but we caught up to speed pretty quickly with free agency, and got everybody on board, and so actually, I kind of like it because doing free, so, you know, the agents didn't have time to posture and do make a long, you know, hold out for a long time, trying to make deals, so it kind of worked out in our favor a little bit as well.

A couple more questions. What adjustments one has to make in process, okay, you go through the season, you go through the playoffs, now you got to come and prepare for the Super Bowl. Well, you know, you know, to make it through all the peaks in the valleys of the season, and then to get hot late in the season, and to get on the run here, and to play off, and have a chance to play in a Super Bowl, that's what we play for, you know, that's our goal every year, to make our team relevant, and have a chance to play in a Super Bowl, so we're glad to be here, and we're looking for the great opportunity we have on Sunday. You giving out reasons, patients this year? I hope the recent people's pieces perform well in the game, what's on them? Thank you, Jay. Okay. Thank you, brother. All right. Jerry Reed, Senior Vice President and General Manager with the World Champion, New York Giants. Frederick Douglass Fritz Pollack was a pioneer, a man who excelled not only because of his magnificent athletic gifts, but also because of his wit, intelligence, and his ability to lead and inspire people, said Floyd A. Keith Executive Director of the Black Coaches

Association, born on January 27, 1894 in Rogers Park, Illinois. He was a member of Brown University Class of 1919. As a standout halfback in his freshman year, he became the first African-American to play in the Rose Bowl game in 1916, and the first African-American selected all-America. In 1920, Pollack became one of the first two African-American players in the American Professional Football Association, later renamed the National Football League. In 1921, Pollack became the first African-American head coach in NFL. Another first went to George Telefero, the first African-American drafted by NFL team. In all-American at Indiana University, he was a half-back, quarterback, and punner, and was picked by the Chicago Bears in the 13th Round of the 1949 NFL Draft. I was a student at Indiana University at that time, and in 1949, I decided to go into

Pro Football because in 1947, when I returned to Indiana University from the United States Army, my father died on Christmas Day, and I had been home shortly before that. But since my mother didn't have an education, I didn't want my mother working in somebody's kitchen or taking care of somebody's children, so I forego my senior year at Indiana University in order to get into professional football, and I signed a contract with the Los Angeles Dons of the Old All-American Football Conference, because no African-Americans were playing football at that time in the National Football League other than the Cleveland Browns and the 49ers,

the New York Yanks, and the who was the fourth team, the good lord, I can't even think back that far. Well, anyway, there were four teams in the All-American Football Conference that went into the National Football League in 1950. Well, since I was in that conference, the All-American Football Conference, they paid black players, and so I had signed a contract with the Los Angeles Dons before the draft of the National Football League came out. So when the draft came out, I had been in Chicago with Buddy Young and Julie Reichovich and several other professional football players practicing, getting some idea what was going to be expected of me.

And as it turns out, I was drafted by the Chicago Bears, and there was a dilemma then because and my father was warned with a fourth grade education, told me that the test of a man was his word. You are no better, no worse than your word. If you give your word, die in the attempt to fulfill it. Well, I had already given my word to the Los Angeles Dons, although my dad had passed on, my mother said to me, what are you going to do? I said, my whole I got to do is give the Dons their contract and that $4,000 bonus back, and I can play with the Chicago Bears, whom I had grown up admiring. And she said, what did you tell your father? I never said another word to Chicago Bears. Tell us about that first year when you were actually in the league and very few people

like you played against you. Now is this in the national football league or in the book, oh, well I was just another black player. That's basically what it was. I happened to have some talent that meld it with the rest of the ball club and therefore they made me a better football player. It was rough. It was rough. You really had to protect yourself at all times, particularly in the national football league because most of the teams had not played with or against African Americans. When you look at the game today, what are some of the things that you like about and some things that you don't like? The thing that I don't like first, I don't like the individualization of the players. Anybody who has to get immediate gratification by throwing the ball on the ground or dancing

in the end zone, I don't like that. I don't like them because I think it makes a mockery of the game of football and of that particular person. But I also know that it pays huge amounts of money and if that is what you're in it for, then you ought to continue it. But I would never have demonstrated in any way shape form or fashion because I believed that I was being paid to do what I am supposed to do and I didn't need anybody patting me on my back and eulogizing me, period. Why is it important for young players and also young African Americans to have some similar who Fritz Pollard was? Oh, it means everything.

Let me tell you and I'm going to give you two factual situations. Fritz Pollard was my idol. Whenever Fritz Pollard attempted to do, I attempted to emulate whether I was successful or not, I can't tell you. Georgetown Feral, the first African American drafted by NFL team in 1949. If you have questions, comments or suggestions asked your future in Black America programs, email us at jhanssenhans.org at kut.org. Also let us know what radio station you heard us over. The views and opinions expressed on this program are not necessarily those of this station or of the University of Texas at Austin. You can hear previous programs online at kut.org. Until we have the opportunity again for technical producer David Alvarez, I'm John L. Hansen Jr.

Thank you for joining us today. Please join us again next week. CD copies of this program are available and may be purchased by writing in Black America CDs, KUT radio, one university station, Austin, Texas, 78712. That's in Black America CDs, KUT radio, one university station, Austin, Texas, 78712. This has been a production of KUT radio.