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Broncos Coach Vic Fangio Gets Skewered By Players After He Said He ‘Doesn’t See Racism’ In The NFL

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Denver Broncos head coach Vic Fangio spoke on the clip of quarterback Teddy Bridgewater making no effort to bring down a defender on a return

DENVER, CO - DECEMBER 22: Denver Broncos Head Coach Vic Fangio during a regular season game between the Denver Broncos and the visiting Detroit Lions on December 22, 2019 at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver, CO. (Photo by Russell Lansford/Icon Sportswire)

PFT – After a day of meetings with Broncos players and team president Joe Ellis to have the ever-popular dialogue about issues of race and police brutality, [Vic] Fangio said he didn’t think the league had a discrimination problem.

“I think our problems in the NFL along those lines are minimal,” Fangio said, via Jeff Legwold of ESPN.com. “We’re a league of meritocracy, you earn what you get, you get what you earn. I don’t see racism at all in the NFL, I don’t see discrimination in the NFL. We all live together, joined as one, for one common goal, and we all intermingle and mix tremendously. If society reflected an NFL team, we’d all be great.”

Some NFL guys immediately chimed in:

Vic Fangio’s a guy in his early 60s and been around the league for a while. In fact, he waited an eternity for his first head coaching job despite years as a top-flight defensive coordinator. You can see how maybe he hasn’t been as immersed in black player culture as others out there might be.

But rather than be cynical about Fangio, I’d like to point to this quote from Chargers coach Anthony Lynn’s impassioned op-ed in the LA Times:

“I have a lot of good white friends and I’ve said to them that sometimes I feel our biggest enemy in this fight is good white people because they don’t believe people can do the things they do and be this evil. They just don’t believe it. And I’m like, “Guys, you are so naïve and you’re so naïve because you’re really good people. I don’t mean that in a derogatory way, but your naïveté is hindering the cause.”

It’s entirely possible to be the most good-natured person around — and it’s worth noting that none of Fangio’s Broncos players seemed to meaningfully call him out — while still being incorrect on this issue. NFL teams blackballed Colin Kaepernick. They made life hell on players who exerted their rights to peaceful protest and kowtowed to pressures to make them stop. They turned a blind eye to CTE and its long-term effects on a league filled with players of color. They have yet to meaningfully solve the lack of black coaches and front office hires. Even the franchise tag process, when compared with the lack of fully guaranteed contracts, has reeked of white supremacy for owners in recent years.

It’s a time to be mindful of every drop in the bucket that contributes to the strife of black people across the country. And for Vic Fangio, that means he has to be more aware of what really goes on in his league’s own locker rooms and board rooms.

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