Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Maybe you've heard
Much has been discussed in the week leading up to the Super Bowl about Lovie Smith and Tony Dungy being the first two black coaches to reach the Super Bowl. And the two general schools of thought are that a.) this is a huge accomplishment or b.) this will only be meaningful when it's no longer worth mentioning. I now have the pleasure of moderating a debate between two ESPN personalities who are both well-informed on the subject, Scoop Jackson and Stephen A. Smith. I've transcribed their conversation below.
Stephen: Yes, this IS an occurrence. BUT. Is it really progress until this is happening EVERY DAY IN OUR SOCIETY?
Scoop: Of course. It's like hippin' and skippin' and hoppin', but you never know until you get to the hop. It's the last and final part. It's the step after penultimate. The ultimate. Skip and Scoop. I myself am very proud that these men have pioneered the way for others.
Stephen: Yes, I know you are proud. I am too. BUT, I am just saying that MAYBE we shouldn't even be paying ATTENTION to this. Maybe we should just let it go. LIKE I SAID, we shouldn't even bring this up UNTIL we see black men coaching the Super Bowl several times EACH year.
Scoop: How can you possibly denigrate this achievement? I feel you're being false in trying to say that we should not discuss this occurrence. You got to be tru. Tru is for those with heart. Heart and soul. It's the soul meets body, says Death Cab for Cutie, which is a cracker-ass band from Seattle.
Stephen: CAN YOU HEAR ME! It is a MOCKERY that this is even a NEWS STORY. Black men can coach. It's not progress until we CEASE to talk about it. Tony Dungy is a FINE man. Lovie Smith is a FINE man. No one talks about how FINE of men these men are! They just want to talk about the color of their skin. It is RIDICULOUS.
Scoop: The color of my skin is all I have.
Stephen: I have NOTICED.
Scoop: I drank with Common last weekend. He's from Chicago, the Chi-Windy-Midway-Gridiron city. It's the smooth between the coasts. The shoulders are big in the city.
Stephen: Why can't you stay on topic? Don't even try to divert the attention away from this discussion. Don't try to ignore this FIASCO!
Scoop: "Fiasco" has not come up on my Google word-of-the-day vocabulary enhancement program. I don't know what that means.
Stephen: Oh HELL.
Scoop: Patronymic.
Stephen: WHAT?
Scoop: It means being named after one's father.
Stephen: I am INTRIGUED by this new word.
Scoop: The father-son dynamic is a crucial element in sports. You see it often in the hustle and flow (a flicker of a flick -- I give props to Elise Neal, who will become the best American actress since Pam Grier) of the way sports works. Tony Dungy had his son ripped from the bosom of his arms, and that has lit a fire that inspired him to become the inspiration to millions by becoming the second black coach to reach a Super Bowl. He would have been the first, had the National Football League not perspired against him to allow Lovie Smith to reach it first, if only for scheduling considerations.
Stephen: Don't you mean CONSPIRED?
Scoop: I did not. I always know what I mean. Each word is artfully crafted to drive a point home, like a hammer to a nail on a bed full of them. Don't you know I edited Slam Magazine? And I know that Tony Dungy will become the first black coach to win a Super Bowl, unless Lovie Smith does it first.
Stephen: I have already TOLD you that this is meaningless. And don't TRY to tell me that I am being IGNORANT of the fact that we have two BLACK coaches in the Super Bowl. I just want to sit down on my couch with a bowl of popcorn and a bullhorn and just ENJOY the game without WORRYING about the social ramifications of an OVERBLOWN non-STORY.
Scoop: You are a racist.
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That, good sir, was awesome.
Damn.