by Steve DiUbaldo
It’s Super Bowl week, which means the hype machines are “turnt up” and media members are putting their gloves on to fight for the knockout narrative. I eat and breathe sports news, but NFL stories seem to be alienating me more and more these days. Maybe it’s because I’m a diehard Dallas Cowboys fan and I’m feeling bitter, or maybe it’s easy right now because the NFL is a violent cesspool of moral bankruptcy. Maybe it’s because the NBA is objectively incredible in 2016 for its on-court product, the standard held by the majority of its superstars, and the league’s understanding of social responsibility.
When it comes to social responsibility, and issues of racism, sexism, abuse, and health, the NFL is about as graceful as racist Uncle Davey after tossing back a couple on Christmas Eve, right in front of the impressionable cousins. It would be comical, if it wasn’t so powerful.
There’s a strong tendency in American sport to compare black players with other black players and white players with other white players. Every good white forward over 6’6 in the NBA has gotten Larry Bird. Black quarterbacks who can run aren’t compared to Fran Tarkenton or Steve Young, but to Randall Cunningham and Michael Vick, regardless of the actual similarities.
I love Cam Newton. On the field, no player has ever played the quarterback position with the combination of athletic gifts he possesses. He’s a 6’6, 260 quarterback with a cannon for an arm and a 40 time faster than most running backs, capable of picking defenses apart through the air, on the ground, and with his intellect. He threw for 35 touchdowns with only 10 interceptions this season, and rushed for another 10 touchdowns. He’s an NCAA National Champion, a JuCo National Champion, a Heisman Trophy Winner, the most likely choice for this year’s NFL MVP, and has a shot at Super Bowl Champ. The man is a winner, the most important trait for any quarterback.
But what I love most about Cam is Cam being Cam. When asked if he was “the LeBron James of quarterbacks,” he replied, “Why can’t he be the Cam Newton of power forwards?” Aside from the fact that LeBron’s true position is small forward (c’mon Cam), the way Cam says what he says is honest, deservedly cocky, and fun. Cam Newton is having FUN playing football. But, is he incomparable?
Here’s what he said last week in a press conference after advancing the Carolina Panthers to the Super Bowl: “I said it since Day One: I’m an African-American quarterback. That may scare a lot of people because they haven’t seen nothing that they can compare me to.”
Russell Wilson is an African-American quarterback who, just two years ago, led his team to a Super Bowl victory, and made it to the game last year as an NFC Champ. But if you go back to his media weeks and even his rising celebrity post-win, little was said about Wilson being only the second black quarterback (dating back to Doug Williams in 1988) to win a Super Bowl. For some, that provided the hope that skin color wasn’t a factor in the evaluation of a quarterback, thus showing the progress of society through the microcosm that the NFL insists on being. My feeling, however, is that the way Wilson speaks and the way he worships the God he worships and how he carries himself is more acceptable to the broader (white) American audience. Go to a little football town in the middle of America, ask them to close their eyes and describe a quarterback — he’s probably white, and he probably sounds a lot like Russell Wilson. Aside from stealing Future’s woman, Russ is about as “safe” an All-American Football Star as it gets. “Safe” is not Cam Newton.
How about Colin Kaepernick? He led the 49ers to the Super Bowl three years ago. His soft-spoken nature makes him incomparable with Cam, though there was some criticism to his heavily tattooed body. As David Whitley of AOL Funhouse put it, Kaepernick “looks like he just got paroled.” And, “Approximately 98.7 percent of the inmates at California’s state prison have tattoos.” And, “I’m also pretty sure less than 1.3 percent of NFL quarterbacks have tattoos. There’s a reason for that.” YIKES. I would leave you the link to the article, but it has since been removed. A couple years later, he was criticized by Bills beat writer Sal Maiorana for WEARING HIS HAT BACKWARDS (Google image search any white quarterback in the league, and you’ll find them in a backwards hat). Kaepernick has stated publicly that “stereotypes, prejudice” are the primary source of these criticisms. But Cam has no tattoos and he wears all sorts of hats. As well as jackets, scarves, and the infamous zebra pants, in all different styles and directions. So again, no comparison there.
Before that, Donovan McNabb brought the Eagles to the Super Bowl. But my hatred for Donovan McNabb and his negative attitude and his flabby body (like I’m one to talk) and that ugly Eagles green make me biased. In attempting to be completely objective, I’ll say this: he ain’t in Cam’s league as a player or as a man. Fair, right?
Steve McNair brought the Titans to the Super Bowl in one of the greatest games we’ve ever seen, falling a yard short of being the second African-American quarterback to win a title pre-Wilson. He was once named NFL Man of the Year. Air McNair was a baller. But, coming out of high school, McNair couldn’t get a major D-1 scholarship to play quarterback. Florida offered him a scholarship to play running back, which was pretty par for the course. So he attended Division 1-AA, historically black Alcorn State, where he was accepted as a quarterback. A man from McNair’s south central Mississippi town told Sports Illustrated, “The key is that McNair wanted to play quarterback, and to do that around here, a black kid has to go to a black school.” There’s a good chance that if Cam Newton came up in Steve McNair’s era, we’d be talking about him as one of the great tight ends in NFL history. For that, we cannot compare, but say thank God.
This brings us to the first black quarterback to reach and win the Super Bowl. Washington’s Doug Williams. On media day in 1988, the story goes that Williams misheard a reporter, who asked, “Doug, obviously you’ve been a black quarterback your whole life. When did race begin to matter to people?”
He responded, “How long have I been a black quarterback? I’ve been a quarterback since high school. I’ve always been black.” And added, “I don’t think the football cares.” Williams maintains that he was asked how long he’s been a black quarterback, but the story varies among present members of the media. However it was worded, pure ignorance was inquiring.
Williams left the NFL after five successful seasons as a starting quarterback because he was the lowest paid starter in the league, despite success. He went to the USFL until it folded in ’86, and Joe Gibbs of Washington signed him as a backup. He became the starter in ’87 and won the Super Bowl in ’88. He was out of the league due to injuries by 1990. He received constant hate mail. He grew up in the Civil Rights era. He paved the way for players like Warren Moon and Randall Cunningham, who became Pro Bowl quarterbacks after Williams’ Super Bowl victory, and continued to shift perception in America’s most popular and God-infused sport, at its most worshipped position. In 2013, when Kaepernick and the 49ers were in the Super Bowl, Williams said, “You don’t read about Seattle’s quarterback, you don’t read about the Washington Redskins’ quarterback, the Tampa quarterback being black. They just happen to be their quarterback, and I think that’s the way it should be. Hopefully, that’s the way it will be from here through eternity.”
And then we have Cam Newton.
“I said it since Day One: I’m an African-American quarterback. That may scare a lot of people because they haven’t seen nothing that they can compare me to.”
Doug Williams’ sentiment comes in comparison to his own era, but the coverage of black quarterbacks and black players in general (see Richard Sherman) hasn’t changed to non-prejudice reporting, but reporting with comments buried in subtext that do their best not to blatantly say: “This is my idea of a black man and he is upholding that idea, or challenging that idea, and that is making me uncomfortable.”
Cam is not quiet. He’s willing to be subversive. He brought race into a conversation that was largely already about race, just by calling himself an African-American quarterback during a press conference, making it all right to talk about in that context, and probably pissing off a lot of living room pundits along the way. So what does it mean when the media or swaths of fans are critical of Cam Newton because he’s bombastic and outspoken and wears crazy stuff and likes to celebrate his touchdowns by dancing?
Is that culture? Well, it’s fashion. It’s lifestyle. It’s a public figure, who was quoted as saying “I see myself not only as a football player, but as entertainer and icon.” Yes, that is culture. Is it black culture? No. But is he black? Yes. And cozy little narratives unaccustomed to being challenged, which live inside American heads, are being disturbed.
So is it race? When people are confused what to make of a successful young black quarterback on the national stage, without tattoos, wearing skin tight zebra pants, celebrating his love for himself but also his teammates, and football? Brave fans on message boards call him a THUG at a time where the thuggiest thug playing quarterback goes by the name “Johnny Manziel,” but doesn’t get that exact label — not that word. Confusion drives a Tennessee mother to write a letter to Cam, complaining about his “arrogant struts” and what that says to her 9 year-old daughter. To some, that’s called swag. To others, like Rosemary Plorin of Nashville, it’s a bad example. It’s not like violence is constantly encouraged, or gay players in 2016 still don’t feel safe to come out of the closet, or the players aren’t hitting each other and themselves and sometimes their wives and girlfriends stupid. But Cam’s arrogant strut is an absolute travesty. Do you think that Rosemary Plorin was black? Yeah, me neither (and she’s not).
It seems to me that Cam’s individuality is what people find difficult to comprehend, but that same individuality is what makes so many people love Cam Newton. This is what legends are made of in American sport. I believe what he means, about there being nobody to compare him to, is that he doesn’t fit into white culture/media’s preconceived notions about what it means to be black, or a quarterback, or to be a black quarterback. He’s different as a player, a figure, and a man. He’s a unique person who has been a winner at every level of the game. It means nothing that he’s black, and it means everything that he’s black, because he doesn’t subscribe to a definition, but definition is constantly being placed upon him. He is proud of who he is.
As Cam puts it, “I think we all are guilty of it at times. I’ve come to this point in my life where I’ve been faced with so much from good, bad or indifferent that I try to check myself if I’m trying to judge somebody. I think we are all guilty of it at times. If we look in the mirror, or look in our own closet, we see that we’re not perfect.”
He doesn’t fit in a box. Just enjoy the incomparable Cam Newton, quarterback of the Carolina Panthers. He’s a winner in zebra pants, and that’s the first time that’s ever been written about an NFL quarterback.
Steve DiUbaldo is a writer of plays for stage and screen, essays, and poetry based in New York City. His plays have appeared in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York. Recently, he was the recipient of the Clifford Odets Ensemble Play Commission at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute. His play “Exposure,” which examines the dark side of AAU basketball, is a 2016 semi-finalist for the Eugene O’Neil National Playwrights Conference. He was awarded “The Rita and Burton Goldberg Playwright Foundation Fellowship” and the “Excellence in Playwriting” Award at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he received his MFA. He is currently a coach for an undefeated middle school girls’ basketball team in Manhattan, and teaches creative writing around the city. He has been to the NCAA Tournament as a player and to the Grammy’s as a Beyonce dancer. You can follow him on Instagram @freelefty.