Showtime with Sherman Sometimes It Is a Black and White Issue
By Corey Sherman ’07 News Associate Editor
After a brief hiatus from the sports page, I am happy to have my weekly rant back. And fortunately for you, I am back to my usual complaining self. As I was reading Sports Illustrated’s most revered writer Rick Reilly’s column on Air Force’s head football coach, Fisher DeBerry and the “insensitive comments” he made, it got me thinking: Are the only standards that the athletic departments hold themselves to a series of double standards? This incident simply adds to a growing list of proof that college sports, an institution that was once known as the last four years of innocent athletics in any player’s life, is just as corrupt, if not more so, than any professional league.
Fisher DeBerry, Air Force’s all-time most winning coach was criticized in late October after making remarks about black athletes which people automatically deemed insensitive. His remarks were neither racist, nor untrue. DeBerry pointed out that Texas Christian University, which is 11.1% minorities, had many more black athletes who “can run very, very well.” When questioned on his comment he explained that in his experience he has seen that “Afro-Americans” are generally faster than Caucasians. How is this insensitive? Did he say anything negative about black athletes? The founding fathers of America time and time again referred to black people as being inferior to white people in terms of intelligence, and yet we celebrate Presidents Day and Independence Day. Fisher DeBerry says that black people are more talented than other people and he’s forced to issue a public apology. Was there even a public outcry after DeBerry’s comments? Not from black people. A week later, Joe Paterno commented on DeBerry’s remarks.
“The black athlete has made a big difference. They have changed the whole tempo of the game. Black athletes have just done a great job as athletes and as people in turning the game around.”
Paterno is still one of the most revered figures in the history of college sports, but DeBerry now will be mentioned in the same sentence as Robert E. Lee.
Air Force was clearly embarrassed about the comments that DeBerry made, but his comments are the least of their worries and they should undertake some introspection before forcing an apology out of a man who did no wrong. What they should be embarrassed about is their own treatment of black athletes.
It is a fact that NCAA Division I Football and Basketball is more densely populated with black kids than white kids. Most of these youngsters are from either single parent households or below the poverty line, or in many cases, both. The Universities for which these athletes play allow the television networks to broadcast their games. And somewhere along the way, both the Universities and the networks reap millions of dollars in revenues a year for publicizing these kids. Do the athletes see one penny from all of these organizations? No. Why? Because the NCAA has to keep its title as the last four years of amateurism before these people go to the ever-so corruptive professional leagues. Big time athletic programs have been exploiting black athletes for decades and they never have to issue apologies to these athletes’ families that they have to live another four years struggling to put food on the table. It shouldn’t baffle people why college athletes are so tempted to, and often do, take money from local boosters. Duke basketball Coach Mike Krzyzewski appears in American Express advertisements and takes home a fat check from his team’s endorsing Nike, yet his players aren’t allowed to take so much as a free meal without being slapped with suspensions from the university.
If you look at college athletics from a business standpoint, which is what you have to do in order to understand this injustice, what you should see are money making machines built on the backs of inner-city black kids. The hypocrisy of the situation is that institutions like the Air Force are embarrassed of the comments of a coach concerning black athletes, while they should really be embarrassed at their own use and abuse of these same athletes to merely gain wealth for themselves and their coaches.
While ESPN.com makes fun of him, Air Force’s superintendent belittles him, and the NCAA hangs its head for him, I commend Fisher DeBerry for speaking his mind on an issue that lingers in the mind of every person who follows sports, both professional and collegiate.
