What Next: The NFL’s Race Problem

Slate Daily Feed

Slate Podcasts

News, Business, Society & Culture

4 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2022

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Until last month, Brian Flores was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins, and one of only three Black head coaches among the NFL’s 32 teams. That number has since dropped to one. On Tuesday, Flores announced he was suing the NFL, alleging that the league's hiring practices are racist. His suit comes almost 20 years after the creation of the Rooney Rule, which requires teams to interview ethnic-minority candidates for senior positions, and eight years after Colin Kaepernick was black-balled from the sport for kneeling during the national anthem—begging the question of how much has really changed in that time. Guest: LZ Granderson, columnist for the Los Angeles Times and host of ABC News’ “Life Out Loud with LZ Granderson.” If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey everyone, quick warning, there's some salty language in today's episode.
0:05.6	A couple weeks back, Bill Bella check, the general manager of the New England Patriots,
0:14.9	sent a text that by now he probably regrets.
0:18.4	He was reaching out to a guy named Brian.
0:20.8	Only apparently there are two Brian's saved in his phone, a white Brian and a black
0:26.9	Brian.
0:27.9	And he was congratulating the white Brian on the hiring or getting the New York Giants
0:33.0	head coaching job.
0:34.6	The problem is is that he texted Brian Forez, the black Brian.
0:42.4	Black Brian, Brian Forez, was also up for this coaching job with the Giants.
0:48.2	And black Brian had yet to interview for that job, but he was slotted to interview for
0:52.6	that job three days from which he got that text message.
0:57.0	Elsie Granderson has been following the saga of these texts.
1:00.3	He says eventually, Brian Forez texted Bella Chick back and he asked, are you sure you're
1:05.7	messaging the right guy?
1:08.0	Bella Chick's response?
1:09.7	Sorry, I effed this up.
1:13.0	When you saw these texts, did they surprise you?
1:15.5	No.
1:16.5	For Elsie, this comedy of errors reveals a darker truth about the NFL that a league that
1:23.2	relies on black players to mercilessly break their bodies.
1:26.8	Week after week, refuses to let black people lead.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Slate Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Slate Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.