Have you heard any in-depth discussion of how race is weighing down the Eagles and Phillies on WIP Sports Talk Radio recently? Other than Sonny Hill's program at 6AM on Sundays, the answer would be an emphatic NO.
I had NEVER heard perspectives that dig deeply into why Jalen Hurts stopped rushing this year and tried to become a pocket passer on that station. I kept hearing, "He just stopped running for some reason" and "maybe he doesn't want to be injured," "maybe he is saving himself for the post-season," "maybe he just forgot how to play quarterback," .... So, I called numerous times to explain in 90 seconds or less that Jalen was likely trapped in a war against the dual stereotypes of the running quarterback and the black running quarterback -- namely that they aren't real quarterbacks.
I wanted to challenge the listening audience to consider how he must have felt winning the Super Bowl MVP last year, only to be left off several lists of elite quarterbacks a few months later, as this season began. I wanted to challenge the listeners to consider if he thought, "What do I have to do to be recognized as a top quarterback?" I wanted to challenge the listeners to consider if adopting more of a pocket passer style -- for the first time in his career this year -- was aimed at silencing those critics and reaching the pinnacle of quarterbacks in yardage, touchdowns, etc. -- and respect.
But, each time I called WIP, I was prevented from getting on air by a series of acrobatics by young, clueless white male producers or, if I did make it to air, the hosts would angrily denounce any mention of race on the station through yelling, provocations and attacks on me, never engaging me in a discussion on these points and always preventing me from building my argument or providing historical context.
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the FCC's fairness doctrine are supposed to prohibit racial discrimination on radio and TV stations. But, WIP has never gotten that message. White males spewing anti-Jalen idiocy, like "He can't lead us to the Super Bowl, so he needs to be replaced" -- when he just led us to a Super Bowl victory less than 1 year ago -- get seemingly unlimited air time.
I hope Jalen can hear one message from a 61-year-old brother to a 27-year-old brother. This is your world, young man, use all of your talents if you want to be the best quarterback to ever play the game. That is obviously your true goal, cultivated in you by a disciplinarian/visionary father, just as Richard Williams schooled his daughters to be the best tennis players ever.
White quarterbacks from Steve Young in the '90s to Josh Allen today can run all day, yet no one dares question their quarterback skills. Randall Cunningham had a better passer rating than pocket-passer Dan Fouts, but he was labeled a scrambler and Hall of Fame coach Bill Parcells, who lost to Cunningham 9 times in a stretch of 10 games, deemed that he was "not a real quarterback." You and Lamar Jackson will never get the benefit of your running skills being complementary, instead of defining, from many fans and pundits, but, fortunately, most sports fans have joined the modern era, where they can see that all of the best/winning quarterbacks run like Young and Cunningham. You are in that class. Finally, never listen to WIP radio and always drown out the national noise about you.
You already proved your point, just build on that from here on.
Now that the Phillies are in the news again, I don't expect WIP radio to cover the fact that our baseball team has no American-born African-American players, that we have the slowest outfield in the league because our management seems to be allergic to speedy brothers running down balls there, and there has never been a Phillies World Series championship team with fewer than 2 American-born black starters. You won't hear that the Phils have been perennial losers recently because they refuse to look for the best players and are only interested in finding the best journeyman, blue collar, marginally talented white guys -- to lose every year.
Can someone shut down WIP, reform it -- or create a much more inclusive alternative?I will
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