By Nicholas Stix
So as not to bury my lede, the answer is yes, and that is why I am rooting for the Patriots.
I like the Seahawks’ mullatto quarterback, Russell Wilson, a great deal. Prior to his almost disastrous NFC championship game against the Packers, I couldn’t recall a young quarterback in recent years who made as few mistakes as he does. And when he did screw up big time in the Packers game, throwing four picks in the first half, he picked himself up, dusted himself off, and started all over again, leading his team to a miraculous, come-from-behind victory, while Aaron Rodgers’ Packers melted at home like a bunch of plastic men.
However, the media want the Seahawks to win, because Wilson is half black, and because he has some nasty black teammates, most notably cornerback Richard Sherman and running back Marshawn Lynch; because Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is white; and because Patriots head coach, who is among the most brilliant in the history of the game, plays too many white men.
Forget “Deflategate,” a classic nontroversy. How could it help Tom Brady to have microscopically underinflated footballs? (P.S. And how could it help him to throw footballs that are not the usual weight he works with? Note too that the fall guy, the equipment guy who supposedly disappeared to the men's room with the footballs, didn't have enough time to do anything with them.) The media have combined this nontroversy with the old “Spygate” scandal, in which Belichick secretly taped Jets practices, to paint him as a dirty coach, and try and inflate Deflate, while studiously ignoring Seahawks’ head coach Pete Carroll’s scandal-plagued college and recent pro career. Carroll retroactively lost his 2004 national championship at USC, due to violations, and his Seahawks have had more players caught juicing than any other team, including Richard Sherman.
Meanwhile, Seahawks fans twice pulled fire alarms in the Patriots’ hotel, in order to ruin the Pats’ sleep and, they hoped, cost them the championship, and one supposedly independent sportswriter even offered suggestions to the Seahawks, as to how they could beat the Pats, as if the latter, and not the former, were the defending champs.
If the media and the Seahawks want to get ugly and racist, I’m going to call them on it, which means an awful lot of calling out.
The whole issue of the way the media uses "hype" or "overhype" re race in sports is one of those media mind games that infuriates rational people. Russell Wilson and Johnny Manziel are two players whose similarities and contrast illustrate what I mean. Both undersized QB's with a similar profiles, tremendous arms, good mobility and smart players (though Manziel seems a bit immature), however, Wilson came in the NFL with little hype and as an underdog with low expectations, he could easily have sat on the bench a few seasons and never had an NFL career or been on a bad team that couldn't be salvaged by Joe Montana in his prime, a situation that can kill a young QB's career even if he's a legit player. He had the good luck to be on a team with a dominating defense though and it gave him a chance to prove a sub 6 ft. QB can succeed. Of course, Drew Brees already proved that but that didn't stop people from doubting Wilson.
ReplyDeleteHowever, now we have Manziel and the white hype machine is in full force, it's as bad as the Tim Tebow hysteria.
I've seen Afroracists scream about white overhype as if it's something that happens to virtually every white athlete and never happens to black ones. Stupid beyond belief to believe that of course, but this is Afroracists were talking about. Plenty of both black and white athletes get hype beyond their abilities, doesn't just happen to white ones though a few white ones seem to get overhyped to the point it's insane.
This is not necessarily a good thing to happen as Afroracists fervently believe.
It might have some initial monetary benefit but in terms of long term career benefit, it's not a good thing. Tebow is a guy who should be playing in the NFL right now, maybe not as a starting QB but he clearly has the ability to be a backup who could slide into multiple positions, a valuable kind of player that has a role in the NFL. That's not happening because of the massive attention he would receive, NFL coaches don't feel he's valuable enough to want to deal with the distractions, totally understandable on their part. It's the media that has sabotaged his career. Question is will the media allow Manziel to succeed? Drew Brees had time to develop his game and finally came into his own with the Saints but I'm not sure if Manziel will have the same opportunity. Coaches like to believe they aren't influenced by the media but I don't believe that for a minute. When the media predicts a player is going to fail and constantly picks at his mistakes or "shortcomings" or what they think are shortcomings, no coach want to have egg in his face by not seeming prescient enough to have dumped the bum beore he cost them too many games. This kind of attitude, IMHO, seems to have a much greater negative impact on the careers of white player more than black. There have been some white NBA players whose careers I believe were adversely affected by this attitude. It's too early to tell at this point if Manziel is going to suffer the same kind of career killing overhype but the media hype machine is already in motion and if he were smart he would stop partying, keep as low a profile as possible and do nothing but work on his game, you're only young once and the next few years are going to determine the trajectory of his career, if he does it right he can be the next Russell Wilson or Drew Brees, if he lets the media play it's vicious racist mind games with him he's the next Tebow.
Does the media actually "not" want white players to succeed sometimes? It's clear the media loves to cast teams with "higher' percentages of white players than "normal" as "bad", I saw that happen with the 80's Celtics, Duke University gets that and now with New England. Is this overhype of certain white athletes part of this? Sometimes I wonder... Jerry PDX