Andy: Out of 119 Football Bowl Subdivision head coaches in college football, only four of them are coaches of color. That's a statistic that's come under fire since the end of the 2008 college football season and most recently, the Oregon House passed a bill that would address this concern.
The Oregon bill—modeled after the NFL's “Rooney Rule," which has jumped the percentage of minority head coaches in the league to around 25 percent, while two of the last three super bowl winning head coaches have been African-American—requires teams to interview at least one qualified minority candidates for any coaching or athletic director positions. The bill applies to all state universities in Oregon and would be the first of its kind if implemented. Both the senate and the governor still have to review it.
Ideally, these types of bills wouldn't have to be passed, but clearly, NCAA football programs are not equal opportunity employers. While there's a shortage of minority head coaches, there is also a serious shortage of minority offensive or defensive coordinators, which are the positions from which colleges often look for future head coaches. This stifles any chance for a minority candidate to take the next step up to head coach.
Andy: Ask anybody what's the first thing they think of when they hear of London, and I bet you nobody will say American football. Yet NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and other league officials have targeted London as the key to globalizing the sport.
These efforts have had little consequence for the league up until now as only two regular season games have been held in London over the past two years. However, soon one of those games might be the Super Bowl.
Nothing is official yet, and the sites of the next three Super Bowls have already been announced, but league officials have discussed the process London would have to go through to make a bid to host the Super Bowl.
Billy: Science and technology are now more prevalent in sports than ever before. TV networks have introduced innovations, such as the telestrator, to improve fans' experience as spectators, and athletes often take advantage of tools and available knowledge to compete better. Some technology affects both fans and athletes. In this column, I am more concerned with athletes' use of technology and would like to consider how much athletes and coaches should emphasize it in their approach to training and competing.
Athletes and coaches have seemingly canonized the use of certain technology into their routine. Teams in many sports analyze game film on a regular basis in order to learn from their own past performance and better understand opponents. During a game, many major league hitters will go into the clubhouse to watch video of their previous at-bat, and quarterback Peyton Manning has developed a reputation for spending hours in the film room. Teams from high school to the pros breakdown film so regularly that some might hesitate to call film sessions an “innovation."
Billy: In her article “Learn a Lesson, Lose the Wins" in Sports Illustrated this March, Selena Roberts addressed Florida State University's reaction to an NCAA ruling that disqualifies several wins from the school's football program because of an academic cheating scandal. Roberts noted that while the university had to cut funding for some of its academic departments due to the economy, it is spending thousands of dollars on a case to reverse the NCAA's ruling just to maintain credit for winning some football games.
Division I sports can provide a school with funding and bolster its reputation, but this potential tempts some schools to abuse the ideas of “college" sports and “student-athletes." When FSU prioritizes the prestige and reputation of its football program, it suggests sports are meant to be a profitable big business, rather than a way to bring together the school's community.
While the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB dominate professional sports coverage in the U.S., less popular leagues provide athletes with more opportunities and fans with alternatives to the drama surrounding...
In the men's NCAA national semifinals on Saturday, April 4, Michigan State plays Connecticut, and Villanova takes on North Carolina. The winners will play for the championship on Monday, April 6.
Andy: With 16 teams left, my entire elite eight was in tact. However, my bracket limped to the final four with only one correct pick—the North Carolina Tar Heels. Despite my busted bracket, I'm still excited for the upcoming final four and am ready to lay down a new set of picks.
I see Connecticut beating Michigan State in Saturday's first game in spite of the home court advantage the Spartans will have playing in Detroit, only 90 miles from their campus. The Huskies match up better than Louisville, who Michigan State beat to make the final four. Hasheem Thabeet will win the battle inside against Spartans center Goran Suton. In addition, the Huskies have a better supporting frontcourt with experience forwards Jeff Adrien and Stanley Robinson that can provide outstanding help defense when Thabeet is drawn out of the paint. The main reason the Spartans beat Louisville was because they forced them out of their fast-paced offense. Connecticut will not have as hard of a time adjusting to slower play and senior guard A.J. Price—a tournament MVP candidate—will have an easier time controlling the game tempo.
Billy: The way sports are watched, the way sports are played, the uniforms athletes wear and the money athletes make all change over time. But sports' nature as competition: whether recreational or serious:...
Andy: Several major league players will not be joining their respective ball clubs. It's not due to lack of talent or a steroid scandal, but rather due to their participation in the second World Baseball...
With baseball's spring training under way, here are some things both of us would like to see happen in the 2009 season.
Billy:
A solid encore by the Rays.
If the Tampa Bay Rays continue to...
Billy: Major League Baseball will soon compromise either its integrity as a sport or as a body of authority when it decides whether or not to suspend New York Yankee Alex Rodriguez. On Feb. 9, Rodriguez...
Andy: Irrelevant. Too commercial. Boring. That's the way all-star games are described nowadays, and with good reason.
While it's an honor to make an all-star game for athletes in any sport, the actual...
Andy: I have to admit that I was not very excited about this game before it started and for three quarters I thought my indifference towards it was justified, but the fourth quarter proved me wrong. Both...
