Sunday, January 27, 2008

Norm Chow Retrospective


I will fill in this space tomorrow or the day after. For now, familiarize yourself with
this story. 

It's worth noting that Chow was one of the only people in football of Asian descent. Dat Nguyen, Assistant Linebackers coach of the Dallas Cowboys, former NFL linebacker, and first Vietnamese-American to play in the NFL is, to my knowledge, the only other. Nguyen retired from his playing career in 2006, after 7 years in the NFL, due to a neck injury. If anybody knows somebody I've overlooked, please put it on the comment board.  

Although the NFL has rules, and rightfully so, about maintaining racial diversity among coaching staffs, too frequently this is taken to mean equality between Caucasian and African-American hires. I'm not suggesting race has anything to do with Norm Chow's firing, and I will elaborate on the real reasons later, but it should be recognized that his removal from the Titans coaching staff represents a great loss for the NFL, and one that should be recognized. Hopefully he lands on his feet among one of the other 31 teams or back in the college coaching ranks. 

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