# Michael Smith on Michael Vick, Cam Newton, Lamar Jackson & 25 years of the Black QB | 08.13

An episode of [The Right Time with Bomani Jones](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/982639043), 13 Aug 2025, 52 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/370fc844-36bd-4f61-8b8f-b4bb010de39a/49912b27-84ab-4eb7-85cf-b4bb01207abd/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=919a7cbe-003c-4146-b592-b4bb010de3a5

Bomani Jones is joined by his former ESPN colleague, Michael Smith, to break down how the conversation around black quarterbacks has shifted over the last 25 years. They explore the extent of the shift, offering how far the conversation has shifted, giving examples like Lamar Jackson, Shedeur Sanders, Teddy Bridgewater, and Justin Fields. Later, they discuss the growing prevalence of black QBs at all levels of football & reminisce about some forgotten black quarterbacks who never got the chance to reach their potential. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time. A wave original.
[0:10] Speaker 1: My name is Beaumontie Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you
[0:12] Speaker 1: get your podcast. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like,
[0:16] Speaker 1: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
[0:19] Speaker 1: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
[0:22] Speaker 1: a hater. We have wrapped up our list of the
[0:24] Speaker 1: top 25 athletes of the last 25 years. We've given
[0:28] Speaker 1: episodes around them to offer a bit of context for
[0:31] Speaker 1: things that have gone on in the last 25 years.
[0:34] Speaker 1: And of course, joining us now, the man who needs
[0:36] Speaker 1: no introduction, New Orleans East's own Michael Smith. What's going on?
[0:41] Speaker 2: Not much, man. What's happening with you?
[0:43] Speaker 1: Hey, man, I was in Vegas a couple weeks ago. Wait, man,
[0:46] Speaker 1: wasn't the same without you. I lost a lot of money, too.
[0:48] Speaker 1: Not like a lot, lot, lot, lot. You know what
[0:51] Speaker 1: I'm saying? But I was not victorious. That's why I
[0:54] Speaker 1: forgot to send you the text messages with the updates.
[0:57] Speaker 2: But did you enjoy it, though?
[0:59] Speaker 1: Had a ball. Had a ball. You know, that's all
[1:02] Speaker 1: it could be.
[1:03] Speaker 2: So my first, yeah, I won't take up too much
[1:05] Speaker 2: time with this, but I'll just remind you that my
[1:07] Speaker 2: first real visit to Vegas was with you. And when
[1:12] Speaker 2: we sat on that blackjack table, you reminded me. It's like, look, man,
[1:15] Speaker 2: you earned it. This is about enjoying yourself. If you're
[1:19] Speaker 2: here to make money, you got a bigger problem.
[1:23] Speaker 1: That is what I tell people all the time. I
[1:26] Speaker 1: get people like, I just don't like giving away my money.
[1:28] Speaker 1: And that's only kind of true because people give away
[1:30] Speaker 1: their money in all kinds of ways. You spend money
[1:32] Speaker 1: on all kinds of things where you don't get anything back.
[1:34] Speaker 1: The problem is if you approach it with the plan
[1:38] Speaker 1: of I'm going to walk out of here with more
[1:40] Speaker 1: money than I came with. That strategy is, what's the
[1:44] Speaker 1: word I'm looking for here? Fraught.
[1:47] Speaker 2: Right, right, right. That's an exercise in futility more often
[1:50] Speaker 2: than not.
[1:51] Speaker 1: Right, and you know what? It is keeping the place going,
[1:53] Speaker 1: but I tell you this, I don't know if you've
[1:54] Speaker 1: seen this, but they've been reporting about Vegas being down,
[1:57] Speaker 1: and I'll be honest, it felt a little slower, but
[1:59] Speaker 1: it's also worth noting, it's so goddamn hot that Summer
[2:02] Speaker 1: Vegas is now a whole different animal.
[2:05] Speaker 2: You better gamble. I can only imagine.
[2:07] Speaker 1: You better gamble, otherwise you're going to fry. You know
[2:09] Speaker 1: what I'm saying?
[2:11] Speaker 2: Before you move on, I'm going to just make a request. Like,
[2:15] Speaker 2: Can we do a podcast one day where we just
[2:19] Speaker 2: give the inside story of our last trip to Vegas?
[2:23] Speaker 1: I think we can pull that off.
[2:24] Speaker 2: Okay. I just remember some of our shenanigans that last
[2:29] Speaker 2: time with that art exhibit that we went to. Oh, yeah.
[2:34] Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We can get around to
[2:36] Speaker 1: the immersive.
[2:37] Speaker 2: All right, cool.
[2:37] Speaker 1: Immersive Van Gogh.
[2:39] Speaker 2: That installation. Yeah, that's what they call the business of tease.
[2:43] Speaker 2: You got to find out the next time we dive
[2:45] Speaker 2: into that.
[2:46] Speaker 1: Yes, it was a great day. I forgot what that
[2:48] Speaker 1: thing was. I was about to say it's not a
[2:49] Speaker 1: big deal. We need to talk about black quarterbacks anyway.
[2:51] Speaker 1: That's what I wanted to talk about with you. The
[2:53] Speaker 1: last 25 years of black quarterbacks. Now, I'm going to
[2:56] Speaker 1: run something by you. You don't even know that I'm
[2:58] Speaker 1: going to run this by you, but I think you'll.
[3:00] Speaker 2: Have thoughts on it.
[3:01] Speaker 1: And I'm curious. So when Lamar Jackson came up in
[3:06] Speaker 1: our countdown, I made the point that it is entirely
[3:10] Speaker 1: possible that he will go down as the last black
[3:14] Speaker 1: quarterback to really get treated like we thought of black
[3:20] Speaker 1: quarterbacks being treated. and evaluated, right? Like the one that
[3:24] Speaker 1: didn't run a 40 yard dash because he's afraid they're
[3:26] Speaker 1: going to try to make a run back kick, slips
[3:28] Speaker 1: all the way down, everything else, right? Switch positions. Right, right.
[3:33] Speaker 1: I think something we don't talk nearly enough about, and
[3:36] Speaker 1: I think it is important in these spaces for us
[3:38] Speaker 1: to celebrate our victories because it can be very easy
[3:41] Speaker 1: and understandable to lock in on everything that's left to.
[3:44] Speaker 2: Do, right? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
[3:48] Speaker 1: Tyrod Taylor bounces around and makes eight figures to be
[3:51] Speaker 1: a backup now. That was something that did not happen
[3:53] Speaker 1: for black quarterbacks at a different point in time. Something
[3:56] Speaker 1: you and I, we would talk about Aaron Brooks, quarterback
[3:59] Speaker 1: for the Saints, who I think people think of negatively,
[4:02] Speaker 1: but when you think about it, he's the second best
[4:03] Speaker 1: quarterback in the history of the franchise, if you really
[4:06] Speaker 1: go through it. Aaron Brooks' career was seven years, and
[4:10] Speaker 1: he was out of there. Not because he went to
[4:11] Speaker 1: go do television or whatever, but a guy that was
[4:13] Speaker 1: a legitimate starting quarterback. He was a He went from
[4:18] Speaker 1: the Saints to the Raiders, and he was bad with
[4:20] Speaker 1: the Raiders, never to be seen again. Those sorts of
[4:24] Speaker 1: things don't seem to happen the same way. That boy
[4:27] Speaker 1: Snoop Huntley keep turning up places. Somebody be calling Josh
[4:31] Speaker 1: Johnson all the time.
[4:32] Speaker 2: Josh Johnson got more jobs. He'd have been on every
[4:34] Speaker 2: team multiple times. Yes, yes. Talk about a journeyman.
[4:39] Speaker 1: He's like a throwback collector. He got a Mitchell and Nescloset.
[4:43] Speaker 1: At his crib. All of that's the same. We have
[4:45] Speaker 1: to acknowledge that there are things that have changed in
[4:49] Speaker 1: the ways that we see black quarterbacks, where they get drafted,
[4:52] Speaker 1: everything else. And it's been a fascinating evolution, I think,
[4:55] Speaker 1: that once we got to where it was, I wonder
[4:58] Speaker 1: how much of it is that media stopped covering more
[5:00] Speaker 1: of the important societal type things that surround the game.
[5:05] Speaker 1: But this millennium really starts, 01 is the year that
[5:08] Speaker 1: Michael Vick goes as the number one overall pick. Um,
[5:12] Speaker 1: you fast forward to 2025. We had a black quarterback
[5:16] Speaker 1: go number one overall 2024. We had a black quarterback
[5:19] Speaker 1: go number one overall 2023. We had a black quarterback.
[5:22] Speaker 2: I think they've been one overall. I think they've been
[5:24] Speaker 2: eight since since Vic.
[5:25] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. Like we it's not there. There are still
[5:30] Speaker 1: things but it's not Gino Smith was able to get
[5:33] Speaker 1: back to having a.
[5:34] Speaker 2: Career and then and then get traded and get a contract.
[5:38] Speaker 1: Oh, right.
[5:38] Speaker 2: The The progress is incredible, man. I'm so glad you...
[5:42] Speaker 2: I didn't know what you were going to say, but
[5:44] Speaker 2: I knew what the subject matter was. And, you know,
[5:47] Speaker 2: you and I are usually on the same wavelength. And
[5:50] Speaker 2: that's kind of what I was thinking about is just
[5:52] Speaker 2: how far we've come.
[5:53] Speaker 3: I mean, because you hate to get complacent. You hate
[5:57] Speaker 3: to feel like, oh, we have overcome. I mean, but
[6:00] Speaker 3: we're overcoming, I guess. And to your point, all I
[6:04] Speaker 3: could think about is I was watching the draft. and
[6:07] Speaker 3: I was watching the commentary and the outrage about Shadur
[6:12] Speaker 3: Sanders sliding is, man, we.
[6:14] Speaker 2: Didn't come a long way to where we are complaining
[6:17] Speaker 2: about an injustice of a quarterback who is lauded for
[6:21] Speaker 2: his accuracy and intelligence, not his athleticism, sliding to the
[6:26] Speaker 2: fifth round of the draft. When once upon a time,
[6:29] Speaker 2: some of the best black quarterbacks in the country would
[6:32] Speaker 2: have just been happy to be drafted to play quarterback,
[6:34] Speaker 2: to be drafted in any round, Forget the first round.
[6:38] Speaker 2: I mean, Doug Williams going 17 was history at the time.
[6:41] Speaker 1: That was the first one.
[6:42] Speaker 4: Right.
[6:43] Speaker 2: They were like, people were, white media, mainstream media, upset. Now,
[6:48] Speaker 2: I know he's Deion's kid and all that, but upset
[6:50] Speaker 2: because the consensus at the time, second best quarterback prospect
[6:54] Speaker 2: in this class, slipped to the fifth round. I'm like, man, it's, wow.
[6:59] Speaker 2: We have come such a long way in the discourse
[7:01] Speaker 2: and the conversation about black quarterbacks because they're so prominent
[7:06] Speaker 2: so successful, so well compensated. The highest paid players in
[7:11] Speaker 2: the league, Dak Prescott, for example, black quarterback, and maybe
[7:16] Speaker 2: somebody who's going to challenge for the conversation as the
[7:18] Speaker 2: GOAT is a black quarterback. So, yeah, man, it's really
[7:22] Speaker 2: mind-blowing how quickly it happened because that's a snapshot of time.
[7:26] Speaker 1: Right, and that's what I'm curious about right there as
[7:28] Speaker 1: I think about it is, I don't think we'd be
[7:31] Speaker 1: able to find a clear inflection point, right? There are
[7:35] Speaker 1: little things that pop up that make you go, huh.
[7:37] Speaker 1: For example, Kyler Murray, a diminutive fellow for a quarterback,
[7:42] Speaker 1: being the number one overall pick, right?
[7:43] Speaker 2: Right, right.
[7:44] Speaker 1: And somebody that you basically go and hire. I mean,
[7:47] Speaker 1: it's hard to tell exactly. Do you hire the head
[7:49] Speaker 1: coach because you're going to take Kyler Murray? Did you
[7:50] Speaker 1: take Kyler Murray because you had the head coach? But
[7:52] Speaker 1: even still, it all went in that direction. But if
[7:55] Speaker 1: you go back, and I was thinking about this, to 2014,
[7:59] Speaker 1: That was the year that the first quarterback to go
[8:01] Speaker 1: was Blake Bortles. But the two most prominent quarterbacks in
[8:05] Speaker 1: that first round were Johnny Manziel and Teddy Bridgewater. And
[8:11] Speaker 1: I remember that was the first NFL draft after I
[8:14] Speaker 1: had moved to Miami. So I was working with Dan Levitard,
[8:18] Speaker 1: who could be, I would have contended a tad bit
[8:22] Speaker 1: naive about certain things. And so going into that draft,
[8:26] Speaker 1: I remember telling him, I was like, look, Just you
[8:28] Speaker 1: watch what happens to Teddy. Now, Teddy ultimately proved to
[8:32] Speaker 1: be a mid-to-fringe level starting quarterback, right?
[8:37] Speaker 2: By the way, who just got another job?
[8:40] Speaker 1: He just did, right, right, right. Who just did, right?
[8:43] Speaker 1: But he was not, I mean, we went into that
[8:46] Speaker 1: draft with people saying that he was, going into that season,
[8:48] Speaker 1: he was the first quarterback that would probably go. He
[8:51] Speaker 1: wound up going number 32 in the draft. But what
[8:53] Speaker 1: I remember, and you had these moments in drafts where you,
[8:55] Speaker 1: You remember this with brothers that were going through at
[8:57] Speaker 1: this point in time. It was Johnny Manziel has big hands. Therefore,
[9:03] Speaker 1: it does not matter that he is short. even though
[9:06] Speaker 1: being short had been treated like a death knell for
[9:09] Speaker 1: quarterbacks the whole way. And now suddenly the ability to
[9:12] Speaker 1: run a professional offense and do all the stuff that
[9:15] Speaker 1: Teddy Bridgewater was known for, suddenly none of those things
[9:20] Speaker 1: mattered anymore. And all that mattered was this little guy
[9:24] Speaker 1: had big hands. So now we're going to eliminate the
[9:26] Speaker 1: hype and maybe he could scurry around a little bit.
[9:28] Speaker 1: And now look, it turns out without question, the pick,
[9:33] Speaker 1: if you needed one, should have been Teddy Bridgewater, right?
[9:35] Speaker 1: Like history has borne that out without question, but not
[9:39] Speaker 1: because them other dudes was cold, right? Like they weren't there,
[9:42] Speaker 1: but that was one that now is only 11 years
[9:45] Speaker 1: ago where I can point to and be like, okay,
[9:47] Speaker 1: you see how they be doing us? You see how
[9:49] Speaker 1: they be doing us? I don't know how many examples.
[9:53] Speaker 2: I have off the top of my head.
[9:55] Speaker 1: The closest that I could think of was what we
[9:58] Speaker 1: thought about with Justin Fields when he slipped in that draft.
[10:00] Speaker 1: But even then, that came with a couple of things.
[10:04] Speaker 1: I mean, other than Lamar Jackson, who I just talked about.
[10:06] Speaker 2: But Justin Fields was more recent. And Fields was still,
[10:09] Speaker 2: wasn't he like top 15? Yeah, he was top 15.
[10:12] Speaker 2: And also, all the skeptics.
[10:16] Speaker 1: And all the skepticism, it was fair. One of the
[10:18] Speaker 1: things was the epilepsy diagnosis, and you'll never really be
[10:21] Speaker 1: able to know exactly how. I know of one team
[10:23] Speaker 1: that could have taken a quarterback that didn't because of
[10:25] Speaker 1: the epilepsy. But then the other thing that bore out
[10:29] Speaker 1: in the film proved to be true. It'd be back
[10:31] Speaker 1: there taking too long.
[10:33] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah.
[10:34] Speaker 1: You know, like, that was not a, we get in
[10:36] Speaker 1: auto because it's a brother situation.
[10:38] Speaker 2: But that, okay, but that's great that you brought that
[10:40] Speaker 2: particular thing up because what has evolved is.
[10:46] Speaker 2: That is no longer a generalization or a stereotype. Like
[10:50] Speaker 2: if Justin Fields doesn't process quickly enough, Justin Fields doesn't
[10:55] Speaker 2: process quickly enough. Not black people lack the necessities to
[10:59] Speaker 2: play the position in general. You know, you asked about
[11:01] Speaker 2: an inflection point. What about, and I don't remember exactly
[11:05] Speaker 2: what year this is. You agree about this kind of stuff.
[11:07] Speaker 2: I mean, you can tell me the year. What about
[11:08] Speaker 2: the implementation of spread offenses in the RPO game?
[11:13] Speaker 1: Yo, that is.
[11:14] Speaker 2: Because once that shit started... Yes. I mean, you want
[11:17] Speaker 2: to talk about... It's like now, instead of, hey, Michael Vick,
[11:21] Speaker 2: going back to Vick, you know, the beginning of this
[11:23] Speaker 2: chapter in NFL history you're focusing on, going back to, man,
[11:27] Speaker 2: you got to win from the pocket. The only way
[11:29] Speaker 2: to do this is win from the pocket. You got
[11:30] Speaker 2: to win from the pocket. To now.
[11:35] Speaker 2: You can't be a statue. If you lack mobility as
[11:38] Speaker 2: a black or white quarterback, if you lack mobility, you
[11:40] Speaker 2: are the dinosaur. You don't fit in this modern game.
[11:44] Speaker 2: And so it's like, yeah, we're going to wear it
[11:46] Speaker 2: from the pocket, but we're going to, I mean, once
[11:48] Speaker 2: upon a time, you know what you don't hear anymore
[11:50] Speaker 2: about Lamar Jackson? Oh man, he's going to get hurt. Now,
[11:54] Speaker 2: you got guys like Kyler Murray, diminutive though he may be, like, man,
[11:57] Speaker 2: you don't run enough, though. We have come so far
[11:59] Speaker 2: in this conversation about black quarterbacks that they get criticized
[12:01] Speaker 2: for not running enough.
[12:02] Speaker 1: That was C.J. Stroud at Ohio State. Their complaint about
[12:06] Speaker 1: him was that he didn't run enough. And I ain't
[12:09] Speaker 1: gonna lie. Yo, and I'm not going to lie. When
[12:12] Speaker 1: that happened with him, my response to that was, damn,
[12:16] Speaker 1: now you see how they do a situation for me.
[12:18] Speaker 2: Yeah, that's moving the goalposts.
[12:19] Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, right, exactly. Now we're moving the goalposts, right?
[12:23] Speaker 2: The brother too smart. He a smarty-arty brother, so he
[12:26] Speaker 2: too easy.
[12:27] Speaker 1: Let me tell you who I be feeling bad for
[12:29] Speaker 1: tangentially in this conversation. I be feeling bad for them
[12:32] Speaker 1: slow white boys, man. They changed the game on them overnight.
[12:35] Speaker 1: They used to penalize you for being fast. It was
[12:38] Speaker 1: better for you to not be able to move. Now
[12:40] Speaker 1: they out here like, all right, cool, let's see you go.
[12:42] Speaker 1: They might play some music to see if you can dance.
[12:44] Speaker 2: Yeah, whenever they started embracing quarterbacks as a rushing threat
[12:49] Speaker 2: and the design run game, that just, I mean, now
[12:55] Speaker 2: you're talking about you know, Cam, Cap, obviously we mentioned Lamar.
[13:03] Speaker 2: You know, the list goes on. I mean, that's what
[13:06] Speaker 2: I would say was, because the way the game was played,
[13:08] Speaker 2: because before they could say, you don't play the game
[13:11] Speaker 2: the way it needs to be played. And they didn't
[13:13] Speaker 2: believe that we could play the game the way it
[13:15] Speaker 2: needs to be played. Now it's like, oh, the game
[13:18] Speaker 2: is played differently. We've embraced what these guys bring to
[13:22] Speaker 2: the table. Oh, and by the way, they're also exceptional
[13:25] Speaker 2: pocket passes. I mean, like, The guys that you don't
[13:27] Speaker 2: think of as mobile quarterbacks are actually, you know, quite athletic.
[13:33] Speaker 2: I mean, Patrick Mahomes, for example. Patrick Mahomes could have won,
[13:37] Speaker 2: but that's not his claim to fame. That's not his
[13:39] Speaker 2: calling card, per se. So, yeah, man, like, it's really
[13:42] Speaker 2: crazy how the conversation evolved. I think it's not just
[13:46] Speaker 2: the way the game has been played, but also, like,
[13:48] Speaker 2: these guys are also faces of the league. Not just
[13:50] Speaker 2: their franchise, it's faces of the league. Guys like Mahomes,
[13:55] Speaker 2: guys like Dak. guys that are getting these huge contracts.
[14:00] Speaker 2: We've gone from quarterbacks just wanting to be paid fair
[14:04] Speaker 2: market value, black quarterbacks want to be paid fair market value,
[14:07] Speaker 2: to black quarterbacks setting the market. There are just so
[14:11] Speaker 2: many examples of how we've come such a long way
[14:13] Speaker 2: in such a short time.
[14:15] Speaker 1: So I think part of what you described, I think
[14:17] Speaker 1: the spread offense is a really interesting point in the
[14:20] Speaker 1: role that Cam Newton plays there. And I think that's
[14:22] Speaker 1: something that I've talked about in this series and other episodes,
[14:26] Speaker 1: but I want to try to walk it back a
[14:28] Speaker 1: little farther, right? So I remember when in the middle
[14:33] Speaker 1: of the 2003 football season where Texas switched their offense
[14:37] Speaker 1: and went to the spread and implemented with Vince Young
[14:41] Speaker 1: and implemented the zone read as their default offense that
[14:43] Speaker 1: they were going to. Part of that was, you know,
[14:48] Speaker 1: we've got Vince Young. Right. Like. But the other part
[14:52] Speaker 1: was a recognition by the coaching staff at Texas that
[14:56] Speaker 1: the style of offense that they were now running was
[14:59] Speaker 1: the style of offense that the players were playing in
[15:02] Speaker 1: high school in the state of Texas and that their
[15:05] Speaker 1: program had to respond to what the players they were
[15:10] Speaker 1: recruiting were. were going to be able to do what
[15:12] Speaker 1: they were going to be capable of doing. Now, you
[15:14] Speaker 1: could argue that's a bit of a shortcut because you
[15:16] Speaker 1: should be able to develop them into whatever it is
[15:18] Speaker 1: that you need them to be. But I think we
[15:21] Speaker 1: saw that same phenomenon start to happen as the spread
[15:25] Speaker 1: game became more proliferate in college. And that also then
[15:30] Speaker 1: required the NFL to make some adaptations because offensive line
[15:33] Speaker 1: play is one thing you know about this. Having to
[15:35] Speaker 1: teach offensive linemen how to play NFL offensive line versus
[15:38] Speaker 1: college line is like a challenge. But you know something
[15:42] Speaker 1: else that happens now in the doesn't that doesn't happen
[15:45] Speaker 1: in the NFL or something that happens in the NFL
[15:48] Speaker 1: now they didn't before, which is immediate impact rookie wide receivers.
[15:53] Speaker 1: Randy Moss was such an anomaly before because there was
[15:57] Speaker 1: you really couldn't tell. which of the college guys was
[16:01] Speaker 1: going to turn into a pro guy because it was
[16:03] Speaker 1: such a different game moving up. Now everything has changed.
[16:07] Speaker 1: I think it's maybe because of the 7-on-7, whatever it is.
[16:10] Speaker 1: The point I'm making is that at the lower levels,
[16:13] Speaker 1: a style of offense began to spread that then caught
[16:17] Speaker 1: on in the NFL, and Cam Newton became important because
[16:20] Speaker 1: he was the spread college quarterback. Sam Bradford was a
[16:23] Speaker 1: similar case the year before because he played in the
[16:25] Speaker 1: spread at Oklahoma and was still the number one overall pick.
[16:28] Speaker 1: The difference is Cam Newton was in one of the
[16:29] Speaker 1: most loaded drafts there has ever been.
[16:31] Speaker 4: Right.
[16:32] Speaker 1: And if you redid that draft, he'd still be the
[16:34] Speaker 1: number one overall pick because you couldn't pass up on
[16:36] Speaker 1: that guy. And if you were going to do that,
[16:38] Speaker 1: you were going to need to start putting some stuff
[16:40] Speaker 1: in that worked for him. And then as that went,
[16:44] Speaker 1: that offered more of a premium for a quarterback who
[16:48] Speaker 1: could move. Yeah. And. I'm not saying that black people
[16:52] Speaker 1: are faster than white people. I'm saying that, but I
[16:55] Speaker 1: am saying that everybody thinks that black people are faster
[17:00] Speaker 1: than white people. Therefore, if you say the quarterback got
[17:03] Speaker 1: to have some speed, now you got to start talking
[17:05] Speaker 1: about these black quarterbacks. That's like the schools that ran
[17:08] Speaker 1: the wishbone. Hey, man, if we're going to be playing
[17:11] Speaker 1: the speed game, we might have to get some racial
[17:14] Speaker 1: progress in this motherfucker if we're going to try to
[17:17] Speaker 1: make this happen. But as that went on, It got
[17:20] Speaker 1: to the place where we talked about. You get to
[17:22] Speaker 1: like 2021 and they're like, yo, if these white boys
[17:24] Speaker 1: can't move, we're going to have to go get a brother.
[17:27] Speaker 2: And it's not just the evolution of the way the
[17:32] Speaker 2: game was played. It's the physical evolution of the people
[17:37] Speaker 2: chasing these quarterbacks. Yes. If these dudes are going to
[17:40] Speaker 2: survive with these edge rushers and these pass rushers being
[17:44] Speaker 2: as athletic as they are, We got to have somebody
[17:48] Speaker 2: who could who can protect themselves, who could buy time
[17:51] Speaker 2: in the pocket, who could extend plays. Not to mention,
[17:54] Speaker 2: you know, with the rule changes in the secondary and
[17:57] Speaker 2: how much you couldn't touch said receivers. It's just everything
[18:01] Speaker 2: just catered toward a style of play, you know, said
[18:05] Speaker 2: another way. that just so happens to cater to people
[18:08] Speaker 2: with a little more melanin in their skin.
[18:10] Speaker 1: Hold on, hold on. Let me throw another theory out here.
[18:13] Speaker 1: I don't know if you've ever heard Harry Edwards say this,
[18:15] Speaker 1: but he used to say it all the time. And,
[18:18] Speaker 1: I mean, this is a totally plausible thing. Harry would
[18:22] Speaker 1: make the point that once Vic got out there, right,
[18:26] Speaker 1: and you had other guys coming up, Donovan McNabb, because,
[18:28] Speaker 1: you know, there have been various points of, like, surges
[18:32] Speaker 1: of black quarterbacks, and then it kind of recedes. It
[18:34] Speaker 1: happens very similar with black coaches also. where you look
[18:36] Speaker 1: up and it's seven of them, then one day you
[18:37] Speaker 1: look up and it was two, right? But like these
[18:39] Speaker 1: things would happen. And so Harry's argument was, once you
[18:44] Speaker 1: started to see the rise of those black quarterbacks, those
[18:47] Speaker 1: mobile quarterbacks, that is when you saw the penalties become
[18:50] Speaker 1: more punitive for hitting quarterbacks late in the pocket or
[18:55] Speaker 1: all those sorts of things, right? Because as those edge
[18:58] Speaker 1: rushers got faster, if you want to make sure that
[19:03] Speaker 1: the white dudes can play, And you think the white
[19:06] Speaker 1: dudes aren't fast. All these are ifs, right? If you
[19:09] Speaker 1: believe those things, right? If you are to believe those things,
[19:13] Speaker 1: then the way to make the white guys faster is
[19:15] Speaker 1: to slow down the defensive ends. And the way that
[19:18] Speaker 1: you slow down the ends is make it to where
[19:20] Speaker 1: they got to pull up, right? They got to worry
[19:23] Speaker 1: about all the things that could possibly go wrong. And
[19:26] Speaker 1: that seemed to happen. It feels like you kind of
[19:29] Speaker 1: reached a point where... They if these things were the
[19:33] Speaker 1: case that they reached a point where they had no
[19:35] Speaker 1: more rules, they could change. This is just what it
[19:38] Speaker 1: was going to be.
[19:39] Speaker 2: Doesn't it feel weird? And by the way, here's another thing.
[19:41] Speaker 2: Going back to like the idea of intelligence. um you
[19:46] Speaker 2: could argue i mean the gold standard for rookie quarterbacks
[19:50] Speaker 2: you talk because when you talk about receivers ready to
[19:52] Speaker 2: play right away reminding me of quarterbacks and the development
[19:55] Speaker 2: curve the gold standard used to be marino 83 roethlisberger
[20:00] Speaker 2: 04 but i don't think there's any question that the
[20:03] Speaker 2: two most impressive rookie seasons we've ever seen are were
[20:08] Speaker 2: back-to-back years of cj shroud followed by jane daniels you
[20:12] Speaker 2: know what i'm saying and it's like not only have
[20:15] Speaker 2: black quarterbacks dismantled the notion of we we can't process
[20:21] Speaker 2: we can't think we can't lead leadership is another part
[20:24] Speaker 2: of it like black quarterbacks have been able to lead
[20:27] Speaker 2: organizations let alone locker rooms um but they've also hit
[20:32] Speaker 2: the ground running literally and figuratively But what I was
[20:35] Speaker 2: going to say was, isn't it weird?
[20:37] Speaker 1: Hold on, right fast. I want to say just right
[20:39] Speaker 1: quick on that. And I think it's important to note
[20:41] Speaker 1: specifically with Daniel. Stroud is interesting because whatever that fancy
[20:44] Speaker 1: test is that comes out, they try to get process
[20:46] Speaker 1: of speed. No, not the Wonderlic. Oh, the other one.
[20:49] Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The new one.
[20:50] Speaker 1: Oh, that's right.
[20:51] Speaker 2: Yes.
[20:53] Speaker 1: As I recall.
[20:54] Speaker 2: But Stroud did not. Oh, wow. Yes.
[20:56] Speaker 1: Wow. Where Stroud did not do well.
[20:58] Speaker 4: Yes.
[20:58] Speaker 2: You're right. You're right. That was a big thing going
[21:00] Speaker 2: into the draft.
[21:01] Speaker 1: Yeah. It was a huge thing. And remember, he didn't
[21:04] Speaker 1: think the Texans were going to draft him for a
[21:06] Speaker 1: number of reasons. That's a different story for a different day.
[21:08] Speaker 1: But Jaden Daniels, the thing that he is praised for
[21:11] Speaker 1: above all else is processing speed.
[21:14] Speaker 2: Processing speed.
[21:14] Speaker 4: Yes.
[21:15] Speaker 2: Yes. I mean, and coming out, it was like, oh,
[21:18] Speaker 2: he's just a runner. He doesn't throw over the middle
[21:20] Speaker 2: of the field. That's what I was going to say. Like,
[21:23] Speaker 2: as many difficult conversations and difficult, not for us, but
[21:28] Speaker 2: for certain people that don't want to have them or
[21:29] Speaker 2: listen to those conversations being had, but as many conversations
[21:33] Speaker 2: as we have had about Black progress or the lack
[21:36] Speaker 2: thereof in this country, in every sector of society, but
[21:38] Speaker 2: specifically sports for the most part for me and you, like,
[21:42] Speaker 2: it just feels so weird to even approach a feeling
[21:47] Speaker 2: of we've arrived. But it's really hard not to.
[21:51] Speaker 1: Well, the one point is it is not us who
[21:56] Speaker 1: have arrived.
[21:57] Speaker 2: That's true. Fair enough. Fair enough.
[22:00] Speaker 1: They finally caught up.
[22:02] Speaker 2: They caught up.
[22:03] Speaker 4: Yes.
[22:04] Speaker 1: They finally decided that, you know, winning is probably a
[22:09] Speaker 1: little bit more important than all this other stuff. And
[22:12] Speaker 1: I would also like to make this note. While a
[22:14] Speaker 1: quarterback still needs to be able to move, hey, man,
[22:17] Speaker 1: a guy that can drop back in the pocket and
[22:20] Speaker 1: make it happen with quick decision-making and a big arm.
[22:23] Speaker 2: Yes.
[22:24] Speaker 1: Can still be highly successful in this league. Tom Brady
[22:28] Speaker 1: was good.
[22:29] Speaker 2: Joe Bowe is not a runner. He got some wheels
[22:31] Speaker 2: when he needs them. He can move. He can move
[22:33] Speaker 2: in the pocket, yes.
[22:34] Speaker 1: But I'm saying this, Matthew Stafford can still play in
[22:37] Speaker 1: the league. Justin Herbert is not unathletic, but Justin Herbert,
[22:41] Speaker 1: whose problem might be that he's a little bit too big,
[22:43] Speaker 1: but Justin Herbert is not a guy that can move
[22:45] Speaker 1: But yeah, he can, but that ain't what he's here for.
[22:48] Speaker 2: That's not his calling card. No, that's not what they're
[22:50] Speaker 2: paying him to do.
[22:51] Speaker 1: Right, Dak Prescott can kind of run, but that's not
[22:54] Speaker 1: really what we're talking about with him. But if you
[22:57] Speaker 1: can drop back, see to throw, make Geno Smith a
[23:00] Speaker 1: classic pocket passer, you can still do that. And what
[23:05] Speaker 1: I think maybe is interesting about this time period as
[23:07] Speaker 1: anything else is the fact that Geno Smith can now
[23:10] Speaker 1: exist as a pocket passer because he used to be
[23:13] Speaker 1: you will go through all rivals, and you know how
[23:15] Speaker 1: rivals are split it up with pro-style passers and dual
[23:18] Speaker 1: threat passers.
[23:19] Speaker 2: Athletes? Yeah, right, yeah.
[23:20] Speaker 1: But see, but like the athlete list makes sense because
[23:22] Speaker 1: that was like you could play a different, depending on
[23:24] Speaker 1: what school wants you, right? But the dual threat list
[23:28] Speaker 1: would be a pretty decent mix demographically. The pro-style mix
[23:33] Speaker 1: would be all white dudes, which is basically to say,
[23:37] Speaker 1: If you're not going to be fast, we don't want
[23:39] Speaker 1: you because we could go find a white dude to
[23:41] Speaker 1: be slow. There's actually been a measure of progress, and
[23:44] Speaker 1: it is in allowing us to be slow. I'll give
[23:48] Speaker 1: you an example. The late Dwayne Haskins. It did not
[23:52] Speaker 1: work out. He did not have a good NFL career
[23:55] Speaker 1: while he was there. But I remember asking myself, because remember,
[23:59] Speaker 1: Dwayne was struggling in the NFL while Joe Burrow was
[24:02] Speaker 1: blowing the box at LSU, just blowing everything out. And
[24:06] Speaker 1: I was like, hey, man. How in the world did
[24:09] Speaker 1: Joe Burrow, if he's this good, how did he not
[24:12] Speaker 1: start at Ohio State? And brother, I pulled up those
[24:16] Speaker 1: clips of Dwayne Haskins out of high school, and it
[24:20] Speaker 1: was like looking at John Elway, right? Big, strong, drop back,
[24:25] Speaker 1: throw the ball, couldn't really move, but he could do that.
[24:30] Speaker 1: The fact that that now works, like what I think
[24:33] Speaker 1: has happened is just across the board, The idea of
[24:38] Speaker 1: a having it out once you got your black quarterback
[24:41] Speaker 1: shit can get weird right with media with fans and everything.
[24:45] Speaker 2: There's still some commentary that's problematic. Right.
[24:47] Speaker 1: But the idea of having a black quarterback is not
[24:51] Speaker 1: nearly as provocative as it used to be like the notion.
[24:55] Speaker 1: has dulled really in the last 10 years. And that is,
[24:59] Speaker 1: I don't fully understand it. Maybe it's just a matter
[25:01] Speaker 1: of finally we got enough people, A, where the stakes
[25:03] Speaker 1: got too high, or B, you just wound up with
[25:05] Speaker 1: enough people that were like, oh yeah, this has been
[25:07] Speaker 1: going on forever.
[25:09] Speaker 2: Yeah. And also you mentioned it, the college game. I mean,
[25:12] Speaker 2: you know, politically conservative doesn't begin to describe the college game.
[25:17] Speaker 2: I think you've often said the only thing black about
[25:20] Speaker 2: college football is the players. You know what I'm saying?
[25:23] Speaker 2: So And, but once you started getting more and more
[25:26] Speaker 2: black quarterbacks, now we have black quarterbacks in college plenty
[25:29] Speaker 2: of for years. I mean, you know, obviously ask Warren
[25:32] Speaker 2: moon about that. You know what I mean? Black quarterbacks
[25:34] Speaker 2: have succeeded in college for decades. It took the NFL
[25:37] Speaker 2: a long time to embrace. You're right. The notion of
[25:41] Speaker 2: having a black quarterback to begin with. And I think
[25:43] Speaker 2: it also go, but it, but it lends itself. It's
[25:45] Speaker 2: interesting because I would say quarterback, if we could, if
[25:50] Speaker 2: we could liken quarterback to a, you know, a CEO
[25:54] Speaker 2: position or a management position. Cause it's an extension of ownership.
[25:58] Speaker 2: It's like, it wasn't just about it being an up
[26:01] Speaker 2: the middle thinking position, like center or safety or something
[26:04] Speaker 2: like that. It was also like, this is going to
[26:07] Speaker 2: be the highest paid player more often than not based
[26:11] Speaker 2: on the hierarchy and infrastructure of our, of our salary system. Um,
[26:15] Speaker 2: apologies to Doug Williams, who was like in the forties
[26:17] Speaker 2: when he was a starting quarterback, but, um, it's a
[26:23] Speaker 2: denial of wealth that took place for so long. So
[26:26] Speaker 2: it was the notion of a Black person leading a
[26:30] Speaker 2: locker room, being the face of a franchise, but are
[26:34] Speaker 2: we going to write the biggest checks on our team
[26:36] Speaker 2: to Black people and make them the highest paid player
[26:38] Speaker 2: and give them the power and authority and the clout
[26:41] Speaker 2: that comes with that? Because then you want to talk
[26:44] Speaker 2: about some problematic commentary. What's interesting, I was thinking about
[26:47] Speaker 2: this too when I was talking to you, is like,
[26:49] Speaker 2: the conversation evolved or devolved rather from can a black
[26:57] Speaker 2: man play quarterback to the level of blackness we associate
[27:03] Speaker 2: with black quarterbacks. Like whether it's Donovan McNabb in certain circumstances,
[27:09] Speaker 2: whether it's Russell Wilson in certain circumstances, whether it's Colin
[27:13] Speaker 2: Kaepernick in certain conversations. And I'm not here to legitimize
[27:16] Speaker 2: those conversations. I'm just simply saying, we got so bored
[27:20] Speaker 2: with the conversation around whether or not we have enough
[27:23] Speaker 2: black quarterbacks from the days of when Warren moon was
[27:25] Speaker 2: literally the only one in the league. Once he came
[27:28] Speaker 2: from Canada, went to Oilers. So like what we got
[27:31] Speaker 2: so bored with that and black quarterbacks became so commonplace
[27:34] Speaker 2: going to super bowls, getting drafted. Number one, overall getting
[27:38] Speaker 2: big contracts, more than half the league is starting black quarterbacks.
[27:41] Speaker 2: It's like, Oh, we're used to this now. So now
[27:43] Speaker 2: we've got to have something else to pick on them about.
[27:45] Speaker 2: So like, are you black enough? You know, are you
[27:48] Speaker 2: using your platform enough? Even though we never asked white
[27:52] Speaker 2: quarterbacks to use their platform. You know, to make social commentary.
[27:56] Speaker 2: But is this person, you know, are you down for
[27:58] Speaker 2: the calls enough as a black quarterback? So that's kind
[28:01] Speaker 2: of where the conversation is going.
[28:02] Speaker 1: All right, we're going to take a beat because I
[28:03] Speaker 1: got a couple thoughts off of that. One that dawned
[28:06] Speaker 1: on me about college that I'm going to run by
[28:07] Speaker 1: you and get your thoughts on. But are we talking
[28:09] Speaker 1: to Michael Smith here on the right time? All right,
[28:12] Speaker 1: we are back with Michael Smith. And you made an
[28:15] Speaker 1: interesting point about black quarterbacks quarterbacks in college and that
[28:19] Speaker 1: that is a notion that we had seen for many
[28:22] Speaker 1: years and this is true like if I'm not mistaken
[28:24] Speaker 1: the first black quarterback to win a national championship I
[28:27] Speaker 1: believe was in 1960 uh University of Minnesota uh Tony
[28:31] Speaker 1: Dungy played quarterback at the University of Minnesota uh cats
[28:35] Speaker 1: like me and you remember the boy what was his
[28:37] Speaker 1: name Reggie Foggy played at uh played at Minnesota Minnesota
[28:41] Speaker 1: had a lot of black quarterbacks you know why because
[28:44] Speaker 1: you can't be out here discriminating when you Minnesota, right? Like, like,
[28:49] Speaker 1: like Minnesota can't be like, send it like it's the
[28:51] Speaker 1: schools that wind up with the knuckleheads because they can't
[28:54] Speaker 1: send players that right. Like they, they can't be turning
[28:56] Speaker 1: down good players to go there.
[28:59] Speaker 2: Remember Tony Rice at Notre Dame. Right.
[29:01] Speaker 1: Well, that's an interesting story because that's Lou Holtz.
[29:03] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[29:04] Speaker 1: Politics are far from mine and far from yours.
[29:07] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[29:07] Speaker 1: But, brought Tony Rice as a prop 48 to Notre Dame,
[29:11] Speaker 1: hired Charlie Strong as the defensive coordinator in the SEC
[29:13] Speaker 1: in 2001, because football can get weird, right? But the
[29:17] Speaker 1: thing about quarterbacks and black quarterbacks in college, there was
[29:22] Speaker 1: still a lot of places that just didn't do it.
[29:26] Speaker 2: Case in point.
[29:28] Speaker 1: Vince Young was the second black starting quarterback at the
[29:32] Speaker 1: University of Texas. The first one got the job, I
[29:35] Speaker 1: want to say, in 1994. um go check how many
[29:40] Speaker 1: black starting quarterbacks there were at usc between rodney pete
[29:45] Speaker 1: and caleb williams i think a couple may have popped
[29:47] Speaker 1: up but it was a long in the period in
[29:50] Speaker 1: which i did around the horn there had not been
[29:52] Speaker 1: a black quarterback at usc since rodney pete um georgia
[29:57] Speaker 1: has had one black quarterback who started for one year
[30:01] Speaker 1: in the last 35 years, and that was DJ Shotgun. Miami,
[30:06] Speaker 1: it took a long time before they got around to
[30:08] Speaker 1: getting a black quarterback, right? All them dudes was people
[30:10] Speaker 1: from Florida, and then you go to New Jersey and
[30:12] Speaker 1: give any test a 30. It, in college, was very
[30:16] Speaker 1: often a do what you got to do if that's
[30:19] Speaker 1: the game that you need to play. You see cats
[30:21] Speaker 1: in a lot of these far-flung locations, and a little
[30:25] Speaker 1: less heat on you. in some of those places when
[30:27] Speaker 1: you make those moves. Nah, it's everywhere now. It's everywhere now.
[30:32] Speaker 1: And in the NFL, look, you still have, well, it's
[30:35] Speaker 1: interesting now because the Giants win.
[30:36] Speaker 2: I was just thinking about them.
[30:38] Speaker 1: The Giants who have had a, who, Dino Smith, that
[30:42] Speaker 1: one game was the Giants' first black starting quarterback.
[30:45] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[30:46] Speaker 1: Terod Taylor got some run after, you know, behind, after
[30:49] Speaker 1: Daniel Jones got hurt. He got a couple of games
[30:51] Speaker 1: before they went to the Tommy DeVito situation. But they're
[30:54] Speaker 1: one of those teams that wasn't doing that. Jordan Love
[30:57] Speaker 1: is the first time that the Packers have had a
[30:59] Speaker 1: black quarterback, what I would call on purpose. Right.
[31:02] Speaker 2: Right. Right.
[31:02] Speaker 1: Huntley has started some games. Wallace had gotten out there.
[31:05] Speaker 2: But it's almost like but it's almost like you excuse
[31:07] Speaker 2: that because, OK, they have Farvin and Rogers. It's like, OK,
[31:10] Speaker 2: what you going to do?
[31:11] Speaker 4: Exactly.
[31:12] Speaker 1: The idea of a black quarterback didn't become a thing
[31:14] Speaker 1: until the 1990s.
[31:15] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[31:16] Speaker 1: Therefore, in the time that we thought about that, you
[31:19] Speaker 1: can't be mad at him to have Brett Farvin, Aaron Rogers.
[31:21] Speaker 1: You can say that to a lesser degree about the Giants,
[31:24] Speaker 1: although when they did start Gino Smith, they then fired
[31:27] Speaker 1: the coach. for doing such a thing. But it's always,
[31:33] Speaker 1: there's still pockets where it's like, yeah, we'll see. I
[31:35] Speaker 1: know the idea, for example, the idea that the Giants
[31:38] Speaker 1: are going to draft Shadurah Sanders at any point, I
[31:40] Speaker 1: was like, guys.
[31:41] Speaker 2: Yeah. You know, you must not know the history of
[31:43] Speaker 2: this organization. Right, right.
[31:44] Speaker 1: So I say that so that people understand that what
[31:47] Speaker 1: we're saying is it ain't all A-W-L-L-L-L-L good, right?
[31:53] Speaker 2: No, no.
[31:53] Speaker 1: We know it's not all good. Right, right. but it
[31:57] Speaker 1: is a hell of a lot different. Yeah.
[32:00] Speaker 2: And I mean, tomorrow somebody will say, Oh, do some shit.
[32:03] Speaker 2: You know what I mean? It's just, it's around the corner.
[32:06] Speaker 2: It's always around the corner, but no, I just, I
[32:09] Speaker 2: think about some of the guys that hot, like how
[32:15] Speaker 2: they would have been received in today's game that see
[32:20] Speaker 2: you and I are getting to that age where something
[32:23] Speaker 2: that feels like a long time ago was really just yesterday, right?
[32:27] Speaker 2: And so I think about the guy that comes to
[32:29] Speaker 2: mind for me is Cordell Stewart. Like that old slash thing.
[32:34] Speaker 2: Like what kind of quarterback would Cordell Stewart be now?
[32:37] Speaker 2: Or how would he be viewed now? Or how would
[32:39] Speaker 2: he be utilized in today's game? You know, there were
[32:42] Speaker 2: so many guys who played this way that were denied
[32:46] Speaker 2: opportunities because as you said earlier, the league hadn't caught
[32:50] Speaker 2: up to them. They were too far. They were born
[32:54] Speaker 2: out of time. They were ahead of their time. It's
[32:57] Speaker 2: really quite tragic. I mean, I think Warren Moon, because
[33:00] Speaker 2: Warren Moon was my, you talk about seeing it with
[33:02] Speaker 2: your chest? Warren Moon threw it with his chest. Warren Moon,
[33:05] Speaker 2: I tried to throw like Warren Moon my whole childhood.
[33:08] Speaker 2: He was my favorite quarterback to watch throw a football.
[33:11] Speaker 2: Does he still, if I'm not mistaken, have more professional
[33:14] Speaker 2: passing yards? than anybody when you combine CFL and NFL?
[33:18] Speaker 1: I think Tom Brady's 100-year-old ass.
[33:20] Speaker 2: Might have got him. Okay, all right. Yeah, that makes sense.
[33:23] Speaker 2: But for the longest time, the most prolific passing quarterback
[33:25] Speaker 2: of all time, yardage-wise, was Warren Moon. But he had
[33:29] Speaker 2: to spend the early part of his prime in a CFL,
[33:33] Speaker 2: because they literally wouldn't draft the best quarterback in the
[33:37] Speaker 2: country or in Pac-8.
[33:39] Speaker 1: Okay, so Cordell Stewart, who is from?
[33:43] Speaker 2: New Orleans, Louisiana, baby. Okay.
[33:45] Speaker 1: Okay.
[33:46] Speaker 2: From the West Bank. By the way. From across the river.
[33:49] Speaker 1: Yeah. I wonder why he didn't go to LSU, neither
[33:52] Speaker 1: here nor there.
[33:53] Speaker 2: I've been trying to tell people how we did not
[33:56] Speaker 2: get down with LSU when.
[33:57] Speaker 1: I was growing up. Yo, yo, that is an under,
[33:59] Speaker 1: it was in the 20, that is Nick Saban's greatest feat.
[34:02] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[34:03] Speaker 1: Is what he did for LSU football in terms of, hey, man,
[34:06] Speaker 1: this segregation bag is not. Like I said, at some point,
[34:10] Speaker 1: somebody come in and say, I thought y'all wanted to win, right?
[34:13] Speaker 1: But Cordell Stewart went to Colorado where he was an
[34:16] Speaker 1: excellent college quarterback who quarterbacked excellent teams. And there's a
[34:20] Speaker 1: lot of formation, a lot of option there, but they
[34:22] Speaker 1: threw the ball. Like the most famous play of Cordell
[34:24] Speaker 1: Stewart at Colorado was to throw to Michael Westbrook at.
[34:27] Speaker 2: The big ones, right?
[34:28] Speaker 1: And that was a hell of a throw. Cordell Stewart,
[34:32] Speaker 1: to me, is a forgotten figure in that I think
[34:37] Speaker 1: that he is the connective tissue of history between, and
[34:43] Speaker 1: I'm taking Moon out of this, and you'll understand why
[34:45] Speaker 1: when I say it, I think, between Randall Cunningham and
[34:51] Speaker 1: Donovan McNabb, Michael Vick, that generation of guys. If you
[34:54] Speaker 1: go back and look at clips of Cordell Stewart, the
[34:57] Speaker 1: thing I don't think I properly appreciated at the time
[34:59] Speaker 1: was how absurdly athletic he was. Because I thought of
[35:02] Speaker 1: him much more as a guy who could just throw
[35:04] Speaker 1: the ball. But when you look at some of the
[35:06] Speaker 1: plays that he was capable of making and the things
[35:08] Speaker 1: that he was doing, Randall Cunningham was a dual threat
[35:14] Speaker 1: because he could run, but they weren't doing a lot
[35:18] Speaker 1: of deploying of him in the run game. It wasn't
[35:20] Speaker 1: used as a strategic weapon. He also took way too
[35:24] Speaker 1: many sack yards. There is a blessing and curse of
[35:26] Speaker 1: the style of Randall Cunningham's play, which is really fun
[35:28] Speaker 1: to watch, right? The Steelers used... stewart as a weapon
[35:34] Speaker 1: and please let us not forget they went to an
[35:36] Speaker 1: afc championship game with cordell stewart as their starting quarterback
[35:40] Speaker 1: his start his record as a starting quarterback was 50
[35:43] Speaker 1: and 34 um that 97 season i want to say
[35:46] Speaker 1: they went to the afc championship game where they lost
[35:48] Speaker 1: to the broncos but in 01 and two different seasons.
[35:51] Speaker 2: That was the page that was the patriots one oh
[35:54] Speaker 2: right he was going to go home to new orleans
[35:56] Speaker 2: that was the story because that superbowl was in new
[35:57] Speaker 2: orleans about 36.
[35:59] Speaker 1: Two different seasons. Cordell Stewart was the starting quarterback in
[36:02] Speaker 1: the AFC Championship game.
[36:04] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[36:05] Speaker 1: Hey, man, that's a thing. Like, I think it's so
[36:07] Speaker 1: easy to forget him because, again, like other brothers in
[36:10] Speaker 1: that situation, after he got a little bit bad, they
[36:15] Speaker 1: got him out the league.
[36:16] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. And then I think about Pittsburgh. I think
[36:20] Speaker 2: about how intentional we still have to be, not just
[36:23] Speaker 2: with our conversation, but also just with some of these moves, like,
[36:27] Speaker 2: Mike Tomlin has had all black quarterback rooms. Going back
[36:32] Speaker 2: to earlier, you're talking about backups, guys being paid to
[36:34] Speaker 2: be backups. And by the way, backup quarterback is such
[36:37] Speaker 2: a lucrative career path if you could do it. Everybody
[36:40] Speaker 2: wants to be the start quarterback. If you could hang
[36:42] Speaker 2: around for a bunch of years as a backup quarterback,
[36:44] Speaker 2: you'll make generational wealth. But all jokes aside, and I'm
[36:48] Speaker 2: serious about this, backup quarterback, there was backup quarterback, we're
[36:54] Speaker 2: not going to have you start quarterback. you know, Jefferson
[36:58] Speaker 2: Street Joe, you know, because we're going to start Terry
[37:00] Speaker 2: Bradshaw versus like, you know, hey, we want you to
[37:04] Speaker 2: be the backup. A backup quarterback is a very important
[37:07] Speaker 2: position in terms of preparation, in terms of just navigating
[37:10] Speaker 2: the quarterback room, in terms of internal politics. So you
[37:12] Speaker 2: got a backup quarterback, that's not just because he ain't
[37:15] Speaker 2: good enough. That's a strategically assigned position. It takes a
[37:19] Speaker 2: certain type of person to have longevity in that role.
[37:21] Speaker 2: But Mike Tomlin has had all black quarterback rooms. I
[37:24] Speaker 2: think another frontier that's necessary to continue to push is
[37:30] Speaker 2: black quarterback coaches because that quarterback coach is the pipeline.
[37:35] Speaker 2: There's still so much progress necessary for head coach in
[37:39] Speaker 2: the NFL. So the more we can get the Byron
[37:42] Speaker 2: Leperches of the world to transition from being a quarterback
[37:45] Speaker 2: to being a quarterback coach and hopefully a head coach,
[37:47] Speaker 2: I know he's still waiting on that latter opportunity, That's
[37:50] Speaker 2: another frontier, another area of progress that needs to be attacked.
[37:53] Speaker 1: Well, an important note that you made there, and regular
[37:56] Speaker 1: right-time listeners know what I'm about to talk about right now.
[37:59] Speaker 1: One of the best things about having the proliferation of
[38:02] Speaker 1: the black starting quarterback is that it then meant the
[38:06] Speaker 1: proliferation of the black backup quarterback. Because if you are
[38:11] Speaker 1: a team and you have a black starting quarterback in
[38:14] Speaker 1: whom you believe, then the only way to keep the
[38:17] Speaker 1: white people off of his keister is is to have
[38:20] Speaker 1: a black backup quarterback because if you have any if
[38:25] Speaker 1: it you can have any white man in town as
[38:29] Speaker 1: the backup quarterback he could be the president of the
[38:31] Speaker 1: city council if you got any white man in town
[38:35] Speaker 1: in town behind him oh no no it's gonna be
[38:37] Speaker 1: a thing like there was a point at which where
[38:39] Speaker 1: i felt like the packers got it and then i
[38:40] Speaker 1: felt like they didn't i was like man you better
[38:42] Speaker 1: get you you better go get you on the black
[38:43] Speaker 1: house baby You got to go do that. But the
[38:46] Speaker 1: idea that like, so Terod Taylor became bridge starter guy, right?
[38:50] Speaker 1: Which has to be an insulting job to have, but
[38:52] Speaker 1: like he was, you know, such terrible luck. He was
[38:55] Speaker 1: the bridge starter ahead of Baker Mayfield. And then when
[38:58] Speaker 1: the Chargers poke a hole in his lung, so he
[39:00] Speaker 1: could go play with a broken rib. Let's talk about
[39:02] Speaker 1: that in the first place. Like what that tells me
[39:04] Speaker 1: now is ain't no bull playing with broken ribs. We
[39:07] Speaker 1: done with that. Like I treat that like we got
[39:09] Speaker 1: to treat calf strains after what happened to Tyrese Halliburton.
[39:12] Speaker 2: That's exactly right.
[39:13] Speaker 1: No, we ain't doing this.
[39:15] Speaker 2: Calf strains to now. Yeah, no doubt.
[39:18] Speaker 1: But that's, I mean, it's been a fascinating journey to
[39:22] Speaker 1: think about. And I think about Like Dominique and I
[39:25] Speaker 1: always talk about how we got enough black quarterbacks now
[39:27] Speaker 1: that we ain't got to lie, right? Like my daddy
[39:29] Speaker 1: ain't got to pretend. like Tony Banks is better than
[39:31] Speaker 1: he was. We don't have to, we don't have to
[39:33] Speaker 1: masquerade in this, but I do kind of like think
[39:36] Speaker 1: back on some of the dudes and wonder some of
[39:39] Speaker 1: the cats were like, if things had gone a little
[39:42] Speaker 1: bit different, if the times had been a little bit different,
[39:44] Speaker 1: like I'll give you an example. Michael Vick is still
[39:46] Speaker 1: to me in large part of what if now, of course,
[39:49] Speaker 1: Many of his problems were self-inflicted, right? Like just general
[39:53] Speaker 1: negligence and outright stupidity on his part, right? But at
[39:57] Speaker 1: the same time, if you go back and watch that
[40:01] Speaker 1: Virginia Tech offense that they ran, it was prehistoric. He
[40:04] Speaker 1: was not at all prepared to play quarterback in the NFL.
[40:08] Speaker 1: But I remember that first year, but really like that
[40:13] Speaker 1: first month when Chip Kelly was with the Eagles and
[40:15] Speaker 1: they were putting that offense on the road and it
[40:17] Speaker 1: was Michael Vick. Can you imagine if a 23-year-old Michael
[40:22] Speaker 1: Vick would have been deployed in a Chip Kelly offense?
[40:27] Speaker 2: I think the black quarterbacks who've been successful, you can't overstate,
[40:34] Speaker 2: because people look at the obvious when it comes to like, oh,
[40:37] Speaker 2: you know, the racism, the racial epithets, the hate mail,
[40:42] Speaker 2: the booing, you know, the overt discrimination. But like, Man,
[40:49] Speaker 2: having to do your job when you can't do that
[40:52] Speaker 2: job by being yourself, you got to show up and
[40:56] Speaker 2: be somebody else. That amount of pressure, for lack of
[41:00] Speaker 2: a better phrase, the mindfuck that had to take place,
[41:03] Speaker 2: whether it was Michael Vick, whether it was Donovan McNabb,
[41:06] Speaker 2: being criticized because, hey, you can't do it from the pocket.
[41:11] Speaker 2: And then them trying, because I know McNabb in particular,
[41:14] Speaker 2: they would not run And just to prove that they
[41:18] Speaker 2: could pray from the pocket, they constantly had to basically
[41:22] Speaker 2: defend themselves. And I'm not talking about verbally. I'm talking about, like,
[41:26] Speaker 2: stop themselves from using their best weapon in order to
[41:29] Speaker 2: shut critics up. So the people that had to endure
[41:33] Speaker 2: that kind of thing or just had offenses that would
[41:37] Speaker 2: handcuff them and hamstring them from being the best they
[41:40] Speaker 2: could be. And then when they weren't great, like you said,
[41:43] Speaker 2: they yanked her out of the league. Like, all these
[41:45] Speaker 2: dudes we naming, like, not only were they limited in
[41:50] Speaker 2: terms of how long of a chance they got, but
[41:54] Speaker 2: how good could they have been on top of how
[41:57] Speaker 2: good they were if they were just been unleashed?
[42:00] Speaker 1: Well, I also feel like to a degree we learned
[42:02] Speaker 1: that a lot of what they had been saying was lies, right?
[42:06] Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is Cam Newton proved
[42:08] Speaker 1: that you could go for running a spread offense in
[42:10] Speaker 1: college and learn how to run. It was 401, I believe.
[42:16] Speaker 1: But you learned that you could learn how to run
[42:19] Speaker 1: an offense in the pros after doing that. And that
[42:21] Speaker 1: was the whole thing. Well, you're not going to be
[42:22] Speaker 1: smart to do this. If you do this too much,
[42:24] Speaker 1: you'll get hurt. Like it was, I guess a lot
[42:26] Speaker 1: of concern trolling would be the term that a lot
[42:29] Speaker 1: of people use. But we found out like the idea
[42:31] Speaker 1: that being fast was a bad thing.
[42:33] Speaker 4: Yeah.
[42:34] Speaker 1: It's crazy. Unless you're John Elway, right? But to be
[42:38] Speaker 1: fair to the old logic, I do think that history
[42:41] Speaker 1: has borne out and it's been true. You do need
[42:44] Speaker 1: to be able to do it from the pocket. Right?
[42:47] Speaker 2: Yes. No question.
[42:48] Speaker 1: The problem was acting like being fast was a problem
[42:51] Speaker 1: in and of itself.
[42:52] Speaker 2: Right?
[42:52] Speaker 1: But when you hear somebody like Steve Young talk about,
[42:55] Speaker 1: I had to learn to stand there and do it.
[42:57] Speaker 1: And Steve Young, to this day, is the best athletic
[43:01] Speaker 1: quarterback in the history of the NFL.
[43:03] Speaker 4: Right?
[43:03] Speaker 1: Like, I don't think we have.
[43:05] Speaker 2: I don't know if I even qualify. Like, Steve Young,
[43:07] Speaker 2: circa 1993, 1992, three, four, five. Might have been the
[43:12] Speaker 2: best four-year stretch I've ever seen a quarterback play.
[43:15] Speaker 1: Yes.
[43:16] Speaker 2: Right.
[43:16] Speaker 1: It absolutely is. But it is so funny because a
[43:18] Speaker 1: guy that absolutely saw the value of mobility in your
[43:20] Speaker 1: quarterback was Walsh.
[43:22] Speaker 2: Yes, he did.
[43:23] Speaker 1: Montana was not Steve Young, obviously, but part of the
[43:26] Speaker 1: appeal of Montana was his ability to get out, buy
[43:29] Speaker 1: some time, roll out, pick up some yards when you
[43:32] Speaker 1: needed them and get it done. And so this idea
[43:35] Speaker 1: that being able to move was a problem. And since
[43:37] Speaker 1: they think they could all dance, think they could all run,
[43:40] Speaker 1: whatever it is. You know what I'm saying? And that's
[43:43] Speaker 1: how you wind up in a world where Lamar Jackson
[43:45] Speaker 1: has to not run the 40.
[43:46] Speaker 2: I also was thinking about your question earlier about trying
[43:52] Speaker 2: to pinpoint inflection points. I know this precedes 2001. But
[43:58] Speaker 2: since we're kind of going a little farther back anyway.
[44:00] Speaker 1: Yeah, go ahead.
[44:01] Speaker 2: McNair, not only getting drafted, was it third?
[44:05] Speaker 1: Third.
[44:06] Speaker 2: Yeah, third overall, but out of an HBCU at that.
[44:09] Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying? Now, other HBCU quarterbacks, obviously,
[44:13] Speaker 2: to be clear, Shaq Harris, Williams is a long list,
[44:16] Speaker 2: but third overall in the modern NFL from an HBCU.
[44:21] Speaker 2: That was another big deal at the time.
[44:24] Speaker 1: Well, also what is interesting about McNabb is I think,
[44:28] Speaker 1: and you could pull up rushing yard numbers all you want.
[44:31] Speaker 1: That's fine. People think of McNabb. McNair, I'm sorry.
[44:36] Speaker 2: McNair. Yeah.
[44:37] Speaker 1: People think of McNair as a running quarterback in a
[44:41] Speaker 1: way that I do not because I saw him play
[44:43] Speaker 1: at Alcorn. They were dropping back with eight, nine wide
[44:47] Speaker 1: receivers if they could and just throwing the ball 70,
[44:50] Speaker 1: 80 times. Yeah, I don't think people I think people
[44:53] Speaker 1: who had heard about McNair at Alcorn, I don't think
[44:56] Speaker 1: they really had a true idea of. what kind of
[45:00] Speaker 1: pass player he was. And he was a passer. That was,
[45:04] Speaker 1: it was air McNair, not running McNair.
[45:06] Speaker 2: Right. Not ground. Not FedEx ground. It was air McNair.
[45:10] Speaker 1: It was air McNair. And then once he got to
[45:12] Speaker 1: the league, as could happen from time to time, you
[45:15] Speaker 1: get more running with him. Case in point, North Turner
[45:18] Speaker 1: having Teddy Bridgewater run the zone read.
[45:21] Speaker 2: Yeah. That's when you said him earlier, I was thinking
[45:23] Speaker 2: about Bridgewater. Like what could he have been if he
[45:24] Speaker 2: not blown out his knees? Um, I had a thought
[45:30] Speaker 2: about McNair when you were talking about him. I lost it.
[45:33] Speaker 2: It'll come back. I'm getting old. You said something about
[45:38] Speaker 2: McNair and I had a thought that I wanted to
[45:40] Speaker 2: chime in with, but I just lost it.
[45:41] Speaker 1: Hey, Steve McNair, this close to being a Super Bowl champion.
[45:46] Speaker 1: Think about this. One yard more, he's a Super Bowl
[45:50] Speaker 1: champion and may be in the Hall of Fame and
[45:54] Speaker 1: Kurt Warner is not. I think McNair would be a
[45:59] Speaker 1: fringe Hall of Fame case at best, but he would
[46:01] Speaker 1: have a Super Bowl ring. Kurt Warner without that ring
[46:05] Speaker 1: is not in the Hall of Fame.
[46:07] Speaker 2: You know how cold you got to be? to steal
[46:11] Speaker 2: half an MVP from Peyton Manning? Yes, he did. I mean,
[46:18] Speaker 2: Steve McNair is so cold. They said, you know what, Peyton?
[46:21] Speaker 2: You're going to have to share this joint.
[46:23] Speaker 1: You might be the golden boy. Yo, not even going
[46:25] Speaker 1: to lie. That is one of many moments that I
[46:28] Speaker 1: believe that if I were a white person and I
[46:30] Speaker 1: was trying to compile my see racism is over.
[46:33] Speaker 4: List, that would be on the list it'd be right
[46:42] Speaker 4: there with adrian peterson 2012 nfl.
[46:46] Speaker 1: Mvp yeah paint man is too right like like see
[46:50] Speaker 1: there it is like i need to stop giving any
[46:51] Speaker 1: white people material not all white people just the ones
[46:54] Speaker 1: that would be looking for it.
[46:55] Speaker 2: But making the big narrows all the frame but yeah
[46:57] Speaker 2: i mean with a super bowl win an mvp under
[46:59] Speaker 2: his belt um the numbers he compiled, the way he won.
[47:04] Speaker 2: Toughest quarterback, he don't take a backseat to anybody when
[47:07] Speaker 2: it comes to toughness. Dude would not practice all week,
[47:10] Speaker 2: be in the training room all week on the trainer's table,
[47:12] Speaker 2: barely moving and go out there and put his body
[47:15] Speaker 2: on the line. So yeah, man, you remember, just apropos
[47:20] Speaker 2: of nothing, you remember going to them dances, taking them
[47:24] Speaker 2: pictures with the fellas? Remember that Oilers number nine, how
[47:28] Speaker 2: cold that was? Oh, man. That's back in my jersey
[47:32] Speaker 2: collecting days. I just had a flashback of that.
[47:35] Speaker 1: I now imagine Michael Smith in front of a blanket
[47:38] Speaker 1: with a picture of Alexis on it. With his Steve
[47:41] Speaker 1: McNair number nine jersey.
[47:42] Speaker 2: With picture me rolling. I had my daughter cracking up
[47:52] Speaker 2: the other day. I was talking about the after exam jam.
[47:54] Speaker 2: Them dancers in high school, man.
[47:56] Speaker 4: Bruh.
[47:58] Speaker 2: Bringing back memories.
[47:59] Speaker 1: That's right, because you from one of them dancing cities.
[48:01] Speaker 1: I'm from Houston. Houston is not a dancing city.
[48:03] Speaker 2: It's not? Y'all have talent shows called Explosion?
[48:06] Speaker 1: Brother.
[48:07] Speaker 2: We have talent shows.
[48:08] Speaker 1: Brother, I don't feel confident using the appropriate language necessary
[48:15] Speaker 1: to explain the way that I believe that men in
[48:17] Speaker 1: Houston view dancing, who is supposed to do it, and
[48:21] Speaker 1: why they are supposed to do it. But if you
[48:24] Speaker 1: look up the only song in Houston about a dance,
[48:27] Speaker 1: it was the South Side, and it is not a dance.
[48:29] Speaker 1: It is simply moving your hands to either side to
[48:32] Speaker 1: the beat. We are not a... And, like, I got
[48:34] Speaker 1: to Atlanta, and I'm like, what are all these men
[48:37] Speaker 1: out here doing dancing?
[48:39] Speaker 2: Well, just to be clear, just because when I say dance...
[48:41] Speaker 2: I don't mean I was dead. I mean like a
[48:43] Speaker 2: sock hop as the old.
[48:44] Speaker 1: Folks used to call it.
[48:45] Speaker 2: I know what you were saying. I get that. I
[48:48] Speaker 2: get you there.
[48:49] Speaker 1: But you talking about like explosion or whatever?
[48:51] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I couldn't do it. This is going
[48:54] Speaker 2: to shock you.
[48:55] Speaker 1: But at least you knew anybody. Brother, I'm just saying this.
[49:00] Speaker 1: But when you talk about the fact that the fellas
[49:02] Speaker 1: might have a dance group?
[49:03] Speaker 2: Nah, nah, nah.
[49:04] Speaker 1: That didn't happen there. Let me tell you something funny
[49:06] Speaker 1: right fast before we go. You're talking about not being
[49:09] Speaker 1: able to dance. I can't dance either. I can't dance
[49:10] Speaker 1: to save my life, right?
[49:11] Speaker 2: Me neither.
[49:12] Speaker 1: And I was talking to a good friend of mine
[49:14] Speaker 1: and he was talking about how his son can't dance
[49:16] Speaker 1: and he can't dance, but he had to have a
[49:18] Speaker 1: hard conversation with him, which is... is as long as
[49:21] Speaker 1: you're going to be black, brother, there is no opting
[49:23] Speaker 1: out of the dancing. If you at a party and
[49:26] Speaker 1: it's a girl and you try to make it happen,
[49:29] Speaker 1: you're going to have to dance at some point. There's no,
[49:35] Speaker 1: you don't get to say, I don't do that. That
[49:37] Speaker 1: is not on the board. And unlike white people, you
[49:41] Speaker 1: will be judged. You need to know that, too. You
[49:44] Speaker 1: can't dance, you will be judged. White privilege is the
[49:47] Speaker 1: dance floor. Do whatever you want. The beat is what
[49:50] Speaker 1: you say the beat is. That's what's going on there. But, brother,
[49:54] Speaker 1: you're going to have to get out there and do it.
[49:57] Speaker 1: I feel like you can opt out of the electric
[49:59] Speaker 1: slide or any of them country-ass line dances. You don't
[50:02] Speaker 1: have to do that. But the other stuff, nah, brother,
[50:04] Speaker 1: you're going to have to get in there just a
[50:06] Speaker 1: little bit.
[50:07] Speaker 2: Hey, all I'm going to say is, man, you don't...
[50:10] Speaker 2: You want to laugh. I mean, people have seen me
[50:12] Speaker 2: dance before. They're laughing at me, not with me. Let's
[50:16] Speaker 2: put it that way. Yeah, nah.
[50:19] Speaker 1: People have seen it. Nah, like I said, my favorite
[50:22] Speaker 1: dance move used to be when you pull your T-shirt
[50:24] Speaker 1: up a little bit. That was the best dance move
[50:28] Speaker 1: I had to offer, really.
[50:29] Speaker 2: Swishing your body from side to side?
[50:31] Speaker 1: Yeah. I ain't got a lot, brother. I ain't got
[50:35] Speaker 1: a lot. I'm good at math, though. You know what
[50:38] Speaker 1: I'm saying?
[50:39] Speaker 2: You're good at this talking thing.
[50:40] Speaker 1: That's right. That's right.
[50:42] Speaker 2: That's right.
[50:42] Speaker 1: If we could go somewhere without all this loud-ass music,
[50:45] Speaker 1: I could regale you with all kinds of charms. Instead,
[50:48] Speaker 1: you out here dropping it, and I'm trying not to fall.
[50:52] Speaker 2: That's what's up, man. It's always a pleasure talking to you, bro.
[50:54] Speaker 1: I appreciate you, man. Michael Smith, my brother. I will
[50:57] Speaker 1: talk to you soon.
[50:58] Speaker 2: I always feel like I go down memory lane. If
[51:01] Speaker 2: we'd have grown up together, man, we'd have been unfair.
[51:04] Speaker 1: We'd have been unfair, to be perfectly honest. It would
[51:07] Speaker 1: have worked out well. They'd have wrote a Jet Magazine
[51:08] Speaker 1: article about the two brothers of the same block. Look
[51:11] Speaker 1: how far they done come.
[51:13] Speaker 2: No doubt. Love you, man. Appreciate you.
[51:15] Speaker 1: Love you too, brother. Ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much
[51:17] Speaker 1: for joining us here on The Right Time. We do
[51:18] Speaker 1: this thing three times a week. Ryan Brumley handling everything
[51:21] Speaker 1: behind the scenes. Thank you, sir. Remember, follow The Right Time. Subscribe, like,
[51:25] Speaker 1: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
[51:27] Speaker 1: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
[51:29] Speaker 1: a hater. And we'll talk to you guys in a
[51:30] Speaker 1: couple of days. Take it easy.

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