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      Should You Get Back With Your Ex? In the N.B.A., Maybe.

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      The reunion of Russell Westbrook and Coach Scott Brooks on the Washington Wizards shows the ups and downs of top stars’ working with their former coaches.Scott Brooks was having a “get to know you” dinner at a sports bar in Los Angeles with Russell Westbrook’s father, who is also named Russell. This was years ago, before Westbrook, then a promising player on the Oklahoma City Thunder, had made an All-Star team. Brooks was his coach.“I remember him telling me, ‘Russell will be M.V.P. one day,’” Brooks said. “I don’t know if my jaw dropped or whatever. I’m thinking to myself, ‘Oh my gosh, this thing is not going the way I want it to go.’ He has these unrealistic expectations of his son, which I can appreciate, having a son.”Brooks said he told the senior Westbrook: Let’s make him into an All-Star first.“He obviously knew the inner drive that Russell had, more than I knew,” Brooks said.Westbrook did end up making the All-Star team (nine times, in fact) and winning the Most Valuable Player Award, although under another coach, Billy Donovan. But Brooks and Westbrook developed a close relationship in their seven seasons together in Oklahoma City, when the team regularly made deep runs in the playoffs, and went to the N.B.A. finals in 2011-12.Brooks said that Westbrook was among the first people to call him after he was fired in 2015 and that they had remained in touch. More than a decade after that meeting with the elder Westbrook, Brooks finds himself reunited with the younger one, this time as head coach of the Washington Wizards.“Usually, the sequel is not as good,” Brooks said. “But I knew it would be really good for us, because I knew what we needed.”So far, the results in Washington have been uneven, to put it charitably. The Wizards are 14-25 and on course to miss the playoffs. But Westbrook is averaging 21.2 points, 9.3 rebounds and 10.1 assists per game — star numbers but also inefficient, coming on a below-average true shooting percentage of 49.5 percent. His teammate Bradley Beal is also having one of the best offensive seasons in the N.B.A. Yet the partnership hasn’t led to many wins.Even so, Brooks insisted that Westbrook has been an asset, particularly as a mentor to younger players, and that he has seen a different side of the guard in their second professional pairing. In their first run together, Westbrook was 20 to 26 years old. Now, he’s 32.“I’ve grown with him, and I love this version of him,” Brooks, 55, said. “Married with three kids. He’s gotten to see me raise my kids. Now I get to see him raise his kids. I love the first version because that was fearless: ‘Only thing on my mind is basketball. I can’t wait to practice. It’s Game 7 today, guys,’ and he would be salivating during practices.”Westbrook, Brooks said, is more well-rounded today.“There’s so many times that mask is just covering my smile when I see him say things to the group as a leader, or talk to him and he’ll say things about his wife and kids,” Brooks said.Westbrook, who declined to comment for this story, told NBC Sports in December of their previous time together: “We were young, Scotty was young, he was learning. I believe he’s become a great coach.”Brooks with Westbrook and Kevin Durant in 2014, during their Oklahoma City Thunder days.Stephen Dunn/Getty ImagesM.V.P.-level players rarely have just one coach their whole careers, as did Tim Duncan, who played only for Gregg Popovich on the San Antonio Spurs. Bob Cousy and Bill Russell came close, playing only for Red Auerbach on the Boston Celtics — when they weren’t directing themselves as player-coaches. Most M.V.P.s cycle through several head coaches: LeBron James has had seven. Shaquille O’Neal had 11. Brooks, Donovan and Mike D’Antoni have been Westbrook’s coaches over 13 seasons. Whether it happens because of aligned circumstances or mutual affection, it is also rare for a former M.V.P. in his prime to reunite with a coach, as Westbrook has done with Brooks.The closest example might be Moses Malone, who played for Tom Nissalke twice, as a rookie on the 1974-75 Utah Stars in the A.B.A., and then on the Houston Rockets from 1976 to 1979. He won the first of his three M.V.P. awards playing for Nissalke in the 1978-79 season.Kevin Garnett won the 2003-4 M.V.P. award under Flip Saunders in Minnesota, then was traded to Boston before the 2007-8 season. He would find his way back to Minnesota to play for Saunders again during the 2014-15 season as a veteran mentor for a young roster.Wes Unseld was named M.V.P. his rookie season, 1968-69, when he played for Gene Shue, who left the franchise but returned and coached Unseld’s final season. Steve Nash won two M.V.P. awards as the engine of the D’Antoni-led Phoenix Suns. They reunited on the Los Angeles Lakers at the end of Nash’s career — a disappointing stop, in part because of Nash’s injuries. Now they’re together again, although in a different sort of partnership: Nash is the head coach of the Nets, and D’Antoni is his assistant. And the Nets’ reunions don’t stop there: This season, the team acquired James Harden, who won an M.V.P. award while playing for D’Antoni on the Houston Rockets.The most famous and unusual example of an M.V.P. and coach reuniting involved Michael Jordan, whose two highest-scoring seasons came when he played under Doug Collins from 1986 to 1989. Jordan handpicked Collins to be his coach in Washington when he came out of retirement (again) to play for the Wizards after selling his ownership stake in the team. In the book “When Nothing Else Matters” by Michael Leahy, Jordan was repeatedly described as toxic and Collins as too deferential to him.“It was clear that Doug Collins was there to really make M.J. look good and have the most chance for success,” Etan Thomas, who was Jordan’s teammate in Washington, said in an interview. “He wanted for M.J. to go out on a positive note, and that was really his focus.”Sometimes, star-coach reunions can be both awkward and successful. Kobe Bryant won five championships with the Los Angeles Lakers under Phil Jackson. A tumultuous 2003-4 season, with locker-room infighting and Bryant facing a criminal rape charge, led to a split after three titles. Jackson then lambasted Bryant in his book “The Last Season,” but returned a year later, and the pair patched things up. They would go on to win championships in 2008-9 and 2009-10.Phil Jackson, left, and Kobe Bryant, right, won five championships together with the Los Angeles Lakers, the last two coming after their relationship fractured.Chris Carlson/Associated PressDerrick Rose is the only former M.V.P. to reunite with a coach twice, as he has done with Tom Thibodeau. Rose won the award in 2010-11 in Chicago, during Thibodeau’s first tenure as coach, when Rose led the Bulls to the conference finals. Injuries derailed Rose after that, but he resurrected his career in Minnesota, spending parts of two seasons under Thibodeau, and now he is a reliable veteran role player trying to help Thibodeau’s Knicks reach the playoffs.“They’re very aggressive in the way they approach their craft,” BJ Armstrong, Rose’s agent and a former player, said of Thibodeau and Rose, adding that their biggest similarity is that they “are very expressive in how they communicate with their body language.”For Brooks and Westbrook, a warm relationship has come full circle. In Oklahoma City, Brooks used to try to motivate his players at shootaround by asking them when the game started. After the players would respond with the tip-off time, Brooks would tell them that, no, the game started right then with preparation.This season, during a preseason shootaround, Brooks overheard Westbrook using that same tactic with the Wizards.“I trademarked that and he didn’t even give me credit,” Brooks said.Brooks said he doesn’t coach Westbrook the way he used to. Because Westbrook is older, the job is more about managing physical expectations and less about teaching the game.“I’m smart enough to realize that he’s no longer 25, and he’s smart enough to realize that he’s no longer, either,” Brooks said.Brooks’s biggest evolution as a coach, from his own telling, is in becoming more even-keeled.“When I first started coaching in Oklahoma, every loss was gut-wrenching and every win was the greatest one ever,” he said.Has Westbrook made the same evolution?“No,” Brooks said. “That guy is still crazy as heck.” More

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      C. Vivian Stringer Is the Thread Between the W.N.B.A.’s Emerging Stars

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyC. Vivian Stringer Is the Thread Between the W.N.B.A.’s Emerging StarsThe Liberty’s Betnijah Laney and Erica Wheeler of the Los Angeles Sparks are coming into their own after winding paths with a key intersection: Stringer’s coaching at Rutgers.Rutgers Coach C. Vivian Stringer is known for her “55” defense, with all five players involved in full-court pressure.Credit…Gail Burton/Associated PressMarch 1, 2021, 12:01 a.m. ETErica Wheeler still remembers vividly what Rutgers Coach C. Vivian Stringer, standing in the Wheelers’ home, told Wheeler’s mother would happen if her daughter came to play for her.“She told my mom, ‘She won’t just be a basketball player,’” Wheeler recalled of the conversation between Stringer and Wheeler’s mother, Melissa Cooper, who died in 2012. “‘She’s going to know how to speak in front of the camera, she’s going to know etiquette, she’s going to know how to carry herself, and she’s going to be a young woman when she graduates college.’”Wheeler, who turns 30 in May, has worked to become the woman Stringer promised Cooper she would be. She has shown a toughness that has carried her on her professional journey to 14 teams overseas after she wasn’t selected in the W.N.B.A. draft, to regular playing time with the Indiana Fever and now a multiyear deal with the Los Angeles Sparks.A parallel story unfolded in the life of Betnijah Laney, 27, in her case a second-generation Stringer player. Laney’s mother, Yolanda Laney, took Stringer’s Cheyney State program to a pair of Final Fours, playing at a level Stringer said would have made her the top pick in the W.N.B.A. draft had the league existed when she graduated.Instead, Yolanda became a lawyer and poured her basketball knowledge into Betnijah, who came to know Stringer like a second mother and chose to play for her as well, at Rutgers. Betnijah Laney, like Wheeler, struggled to find a foothold in the W.N.B.A., getting cut twice before blossoming with the Atlanta Dream in 2020 and winning the league’s Most Improved Player Award. This off-season, she signed a multiyear deal with the Liberty, and she is expected to take on a key role for a revamped team featuring guard Sabrina Ionescu and the newly acquired center Natasha Howard.That’s not to say that Laney’s familiarity with Stringer — from basketball camps where Yolanda coached and visits during family vacations — protected Laney from what she described as “moments she’s testing you mentally.”Betnijah Laney blossomed with the Atlanta Dream in 2020 after struggling to gain a foothold in the W.N.B.A.Credit…Phelan M. Ebenhack/Associated Press“You’re either going to come along,” Laney added, “or get left back.”That’s part of the bargain, too, one that both Laney and Wheeler credit for giving them the strength to persevere through some early setbacks in their professional lives. It’s a common Rutgers story: An overlooked Stringer player sticks around and proves herself in the league. Such was the case for Chelsea Newton, picked 22nd over all in the 2005 draft before making an all-rookie team and, two years later, an all-defensive team, and for Tammy Sutton-Brown, who was picked 18th in the 2001 draft and became a two-time All-Star.But Stringer isn’t certain whether a Rutgers player is born or made. She didn’t even set out to recruit Wheeler, before getting a close look at the 5-foot-7 sparkplug in the huddle at an A.A.U. tournament. Wheeler’s teammates had their heads down after the opposing team made a run, but Wheeler was in their faces, reminding them of what they could do.When Wheeler took her official recruitment visit to Rutgers, Stringer wanted to make sure that A.A.U. version of Wheeler would be a part of the package.“I said, ‘Can you speak truth to power?’” Stringer said. “‘Because you’re going to be a freshman. Can you say the things you need to say, as a member of this team?’”Wheeler assured her that she could. Soon, Wheeler’s mother called Stringer while the coach was on vacation at Walt Disney World, and delivered the news for her daughter, asking Stringer to “make her tough, so that she can tackle the world.”It was different for Laney, who had all but decided to play for Sherri Coale at Oklahoma instead. But a phone call from Stringer, Laney said, reminded her: “I know this woman. I’m sure that she’ll take care of me, that she’s going to be everything that I need in a coach.”Laney and Wheeler played together under Stringer for two seasons. Laney knew what to expect because of her mother’s experience, but Wheeler had a rough adjustment period. Stringer asked Wheeler, a longtime shooting guard, to learn to play the point in her sophomore year. Playing time was scarce as she struggled with the new position. Wheeler said she considered transferring.Stringer is known for setting high standards for her players at Rutgers.Credit…Benjamin Solomon/Getty ImagesBut both Wheeler and Laney spoke highly of Stringer’s trademark intensity, and her approach to helping them overcome physical and mental barriers — “breaking them down to build them back up,” Stringer would say, meaning constantly questioning them to make them think and to act with purpose.Stringer recalled Wheeler vociferously objecting to a rare time that Stringer went easy during conditioning drills. Wheeler insisted that she and her teammates finish. And Laney offered to switch positions from the 3 to the 4, simply because, as she explained it to Stringer, “she was the one who could get those 10 rebounds a game we needed.” And she did, averaging 10.7 per game in her senior year.Wheeler and Laney have stayed in close contact since college, with the two texting each other encouragement throughout their free-agent processes, and connecting by FaceTime after each one signed a new contract. And they are there for current Rutgers players. Guard Arella Guirantes, who Stringer said should be the top pick in the 2021 draft, said she hears from Wheeler and Laney all the time.“We like to call it a secret society,” Guirantes said. “Because we understand: You come here, you hold yourself to a standard, really. And those who we have in the league now, we always have our sisters.”That standard led to the Sparks signing Wheeler this off-season to take over starting point guard duties, after she increased her assist percentage for three straight seasons. But Wheeler did not play in the 2020 season after learning she had Covid-19, with complications leading to fluid around her heart. She tested positive for the coronavirus in the spring but wasn’t cleared to resume playing basketball, she said, until October.Erica Wheeler was named the most valuable player in the 2019 W.N.B.A. All-Star Game.Credit…Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesIt was Stringer’s voice in her head reminding her that she could overcome this as she had so much else. Stringer’s voice, too, reverberates in Laney’s head every time she gets into a defensive stance, the fruit of years of drills and operating in Stringer’s famous “55” defense, where all five players are engaged in full-court pressure.The coach’s voice is clear in their minds off the court, too. Wheeler said she could hear Stringer when she achieved her goal last year of buying a house by the time she turned 30. And she channels Stringer whenever her foundation, the Wheeler Kid Foundation, holds another basketball clinic.Is she as demanding of the young players as Stringer is on Rutgers players?“No, I’m not that hard on them,” Wheeler began. But then she sounded an awful lot like her former coach. “I do demand a certain presence when you’re in my camp. When you’re not willing to work, or you want to joke around, you can get out of my gym.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Jaguars' Hiring of Chris Doyle Called 'Unacceptable' by Fritz Pollard Alliance

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyDiversity Group Calls Jaguars’ Hiring of Assistant Coach ‘Simply Unacceptable’The Fritz Pollard Alliance criticized the addition of Chris Doyle, who was accused of mistreatment of Black players at the University of Iowa, to Urban Meyer’s staff in Jacksonville.Chris Doyle in 2018 at the University of Iowa, where he was the football team’s strength and conditioning coach.Credit…Charlie Neibergall/Associated PressFeb. 12, 2021Updated 9:36 p.m. ETAn organization that promotes diversity in the N.F.L. on Friday criticized the Jacksonville Jaguars’ recent hiring of Chris Doyle, who left the University of Iowa’s football staff last year after a number of current and former Hawkeyes players said he had fostered a culture of bullying and racism.A statement from the Fritz Pollard Alliance, which is named for the first Black head coach in the N.F.L., said the Jaguars’ decision to make Doyle their director of sports performance was “simply unacceptable.”“Doyle’s departure from the University of Iowa reflected a tenure riddled with poor judgment and mistreatment of Black players,” Rod Graves, the executive director of the Fritz Pollard Alliance, said in the statement. “His conduct should be as disqualifying for the N.F.L. as it was for University of Iowa.”Doyle, who was Iowa’s strength and conditioning coach, reached a separation agreement with the university in June, ending two decades of work there.The Jaguars announced on Thursday that Doyle had joined the staff of Urban Meyer, who was named Jacksonville’s head coach last month. Meyer, who won two college national championships as the head coach at Florida and one at Ohio State, has not coached since 2018 and has never worked in the N.F.L. before.The hiring of Doyle, who is white, comes at a time of intense scrutiny of the N.F.L.’s hiring practices and questions about whether minority candidates for coaching jobs have equal opportunities to be hired.“I’ve known Chris for close to 20 years,” Meyer said on Thursday when questioned about hiring someone who had been accused of mistreating Black athletes. Doyle was the strength coach at the University of Utah in the late 1990s, a few years before Meyer was hired as the head coach there.“Urban Meyer’s statement, ‘I’ve known Chris for close to 20 years,’ reflects the good ol’ boy network that is precisely the reason there is such a disparity in employment opportunities for Black coaches,” Graves said in the statement.Neither the N.F.L. nor the Jaguars responded to a request for comment on the Fritz Pollard Alliance’s statement.During a news conference last week, N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell said that he was not satisfied with the rate at which coaches of color have been hired in the N.F.L., which has 32 teams.“It wasn’t what we expected,” he said of the diversity in the round of hirings after the 2020 season, “and it’s not what we expect going forward.”Of the seven head coaches hired since the end of the regular season, just two were nonwhite. Last year one of five head coaching jobs went to a minority candidate, and the year before just one in eight.Over the last three years 80 percent of head coaching jobs have gone to white candidates, though players of color made up 69.4 percent of the N.F.L. this season, according to the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.After the Jaguars hired Meyer and General Manager Trent Baalke, who are both white, last month, Graves praised the organization for interviewing several minority candidates and for seeking input from the Fritz Pollard Alliance.“I cannot argue that the process didn’t meet the standard of fair, open and competitive,” Graves told The Florida Times-Union.The hiring of Doyle, however, raised issues beyond the N.F.L.’s commitment to diverse hiring.Before Doyle left Iowa, Emmanuel Rugamba, a former Hawkeyes defensive back, gave multiple examples of the coach demeaning players with negative racial stereotypes. Rugamba said in a tweet that one day after a Black player walked away from Doyle, the coach said, “Why you walking wit all that swagger I’ll put you back on the streets.”James Daniels, a Chicago Bears offensive lineman and a former Hawkeye, tweeted over the summer: “There are too many racial disparities in the Iowa football program. Black players have been treated unfairly for far too long.”Doyle also presided over an off-season workout in 2011 that resulted in the hospitalization of 13 players.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Behind the ‘Grind’ of the N.B.A. Team With the Next Big Thing

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The NBA SeasonVirus Hotspots in the N.B.A.The Friendship of LeBron and Anthony DavisThe N.B.A. Wanted HerMissing Klay ThompsonKobe the #GirlDadAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBehind the ‘Grind’ of the N.B.A. Team With the Next Big ThingThe Charlotte Hornets are emerging from obscurity, thanks to the star power of the rookie LaMelo Ball and the shotmaking of Gordon Hayward. Here’s how they’re doing it.Charlotte Hornets players and coaches have been using this season’s schedule, with its back-to-back games against teams like the Orlando Magic and Indiana Pacers, as an opportunity to develop their young team.CreditCredit…Courtesy of Charlotte HornetsFeb. 10, 2021Updated 12:39 p.m. ETThe buzzer sounded, signaling a Charlotte Hornets loss to the Indiana Pacers. Charlotte wouldn’t have to wait long to try to exact revenge.This N.B.A. season is unusual in many ways because of the coronavirus pandemic, and one of its main scheduling wrinkles is that teams are playing each other in consecutive games to reduce travel and potential virus exposure.For the Hornets (12-13), a young, rebuilding team that has turned heads with its star rookie LaMelo Ball, the two-game stands have become a time for learning. Charlotte provided behind-the-scenes access to The New York Times for 48 hours to see how its coaching staff — a team within a team — prepared for recent back-to-back home games against the Pacers. There was practice (practice?), film sessions together and apart, family time and a little bit of trash talk.“I allow my coaches — I trust them — to put together a good game plan,” Hornets Coach James Borrego said. “I take in that information, I digest it, and obviously I make the final decisions. But I trust them to help me make those decisions.”Three of the assistant coaches — Jay Triano, Ronald Nored and Nick Friedman — focus on the team’s offense, while the other three — Chad Iske, Dutch Gaitley and Nate Mitchell — prioritize defense.“A big, overall philosophy for me is a developmental approach with our players, that they help our players grow and develop,” Borrego said. “And I want to have a culture as a head coach that our coaches are developing as well. They’re not just static.”Another assistant, Jay Hernandez, recently departed to coach the Greensboro Swarm in the G League’s bubble at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Fla.This season is the staff’s third as a group. Triano has head coaching experience, with the Toronto Raptors and the Phoenix Suns. Nored is young enough to have shared a backcourt with Charlotte’s marquee off-season acquisition, Gordon Hayward, when the pair played together at Butler.“We blend well,” Nored said of the coaching staff. “We have a couple of 30-year-olds. Chad is in his 40s. Jay’s in his 60s, but he acts like he’s 25, so it all fits really well together.”After losing to the Pacers on Jan. 27, the Hornets had less than 48 hours to prepare for a rematch.Credit…Jared C. Tilton/Getty ImagesWednesday, Jan. 2710 p.m. — Indiana 116, Charlotte 106The coaches started filtering from the Spectrum Center following the loss to Indiana. Nored, 30, spoke to Hayward over the phone as the two drove home, dissecting the game. Indiana limited Hayward to just 16 points on 6-of-14 shooting in 40 minutes.Getting home that night provided a short decompression window for most of the coaches before they dove back into work. Gaitley, 33, caught an episode of “The Real Housewives of Dallas” with his wife, Moraya. “Made sure that I was up on everything, so that whenever we have that conversation, she knows that I was listening,” he said.At home, Nored tries to study film only after his 2-year-old daughter, Avery, is asleep. He caught up with his wife, Danielle, before plopping on his living room couch, close enough to attend to Avery or his month-old son, Kai, should they stir.Indiana’s defense was Nored’s scout, meaning he was tasked with providing the rest of the coaching staff with a report on the Pacers’ defense so they could prep Charlotte’s offense. (Gaitley had to do the opposite.)Nored watched the game again from his laptop. He jotted notes as he created the video edit that he would show the staff the next day, with clips no longer than three minutes highlighting key decisions and reads.Midnight — ‘It’s a grind.’Jordan Surenkamp, Charlotte’s head video coordinator, wrapped up his evening at the arena. The video staff coded the game as it happened, breaking it into segments — for example, all of the team’s pick-and-rolls and how Indiana defended them.When the game ended, Surenkamp reviewed the film, tightening the segments into digestible pieces before making them available to the coaches. The video staff also gathered film for the players, such as all their shots or assists, so that it would be available to them by the time they returned home. Surenkamp then moved on to his own duties, editing video and compiling statistical spreadsheets, then sending any noticeable trends to the coaching staff.“It’s really the hub of my program, the video room,” Borrego said.It’s also Borrego’s background. Long ago, he started his N.B.A. career in San Antonio’s film room under Coach Gregg Popovich. He sets high standards for Surenkamp, who tries to be the first into the arena and the last to leave.“The expectation is there to be really, really good and prompt and available at what I do,” Surenkamp said. “But I think with that being said, he does understand that it’s a grind, it’s longer days, there’s a lot of responsibilities that I’m given.”Hornets Assistant Coach Dutch Gaitley, left, with Caleb Martin.Credit…Courtesy Charlotte HornetsHornets Assistant Coach Ronald Nored, right, with LaMelo Ball.Credit…Courtesy Charlotte HornetsThursday, Jan. 287 a.m. — ‘One game ahead’Surenkamp had already been at the arena for an hour by the time the assistant coaches returned and eased into their practice day. Friedman, 30, hopped on the treadmill while listening to the author Ben Greenfield’s fitness podcast. Nored had dropped Avery off at school en route to the Spectrum Center, then did some recreational reading before starting his day. Gaitley watched film on his next scout, the Miami Heat, whom the Hornets would play in four days. “You’re always working on one game ahead,” Triano, 62, said.10:30 a.m. — ‘Who was talking trash?’The defensive staff filed into a room for a coaches’ meeting, making small talk. George Rodman, Charlotte’s director of basketball analytics and strategy, opened by discussing the recent saga involving GameStop’s stock. “We’re talking about what happened the night before,” Gaitley said. “Who was talking trash or posted on Instagram? You’re joking about that, and keeping everybody up to date on everything that’s happening in the league and then you sort of organically jump into it.”The group watched the video edit that Gaitley had compiled, discussing whether they adhered to their main principles of protecting the paint, grabbing defensive rebounds and contesting 3-point shots. Nored watched, looking for points to emphasize with Ball, one of his developmental priorities and an early leading candidate for the Rookie of the Year Award.11:15 a.m. — ‘I’m going to get my game.’Pre-practice: The players who did not log many minutes in Wednesday’s game went through an extra workout session to maintain their cardio. Gaitley let the veteran Bismack Biyombo choose between playing pickup with the other players or working out individually.While Biyombo chose to work out, Malik Monk and the twins Caleb and Cody Martin played three games of four-on-four with Gaitley and the assistant video coordinators. “When you’re playing with Gordon Hayward, you’re not going to get 25 shots,” Gaitley said. “But when you play against the video guys, that’s where you’re like: ‘All right, I’m going to get some shots. I’m going to get my game. Get into rhythm.’”The moment afforded Gaitley a chance to connect with the players. He is the son of Stephanie Gaitley, the women’s basketball coach at Fordham University. As a child, he often accompanied her on recruiting visits. Occasionally, she handed him a binder that listed tidbits about the recruit and he’d quiz her on the drive about the name of the recruit’s boyfriend or favorite movie.His mother’s attention to detail stayed with him.“We don’t recruit at our level, but you are still showing the guys that you care every single day, because if you don’t build a personal relationship with them, then it’s going to be hard to coach them hard,” Gaitley said.Noon — ‘I try to be efficient in everything.’Practice: “You want to give them two or three things that they’re going to be able to remember and translate,” Triano said.In previous stops, Triano would list the team’s principles on the whiteboard with an addendum stating that any player who read the board could come into his office to collect $50. Few ever did.Homework: Some coaches stayed in the building throughout the afternoon, working with players and watching film on upcoming opponents. Others resumed their personal lives, like picking up their children from school. Still, they would often text one another through the night.“I think it happens a lot in our culture where it’s just, ‘I’m going to spend every waking moment thinking about basketball and watching every drop of film,’ ” Nored said. “And I could do that, but my daughter would be missing out on time with her dad, my wife would be missing out on time with her husband. And so they’re my priorities as well. And so I try to be efficient in everything that I do.”“I love playing two games against the same team in such a short period,” Hornets Coach James Borrego said. “This is a great way to teach.”Credit…Jared C. Tilton/Getty ImagesFriday Jan. 298:30 a.m. — ‘It’s always a good chess match.’The defensive scout meeting was shorter than the previous day’s, a reinforcement of the principles heading into the rematch. “It’s the battle of the adjustments to a degree and what can win out,” said Iske, 44. “Can you prepare for their adjustments, and on the other side of it, what they might do ahead of time? I think it’s always a good chess match to a degree, and exciting because it reminds you of the playoffs.”Afterward, the offensive coaches’ meeting included a 20-clip edit of how Indiana would most likely guard Charlotte on key plays, from screen-and-rolls to pin downs and dribble handoffs.9 a.m. — ‘Vitamins’To limit potential exposure to the virus, the Hornets bypass traditional team morning shootarounds in favor of individual sessions with coaches, called vitamins. “A big thing for us is our player development,” Triano said. “How are we going to get these guys better?”Mitchell, 34, started his day working with Hayward on his ball-handling and finishing at the rim. Later, he would also work with Biyombo, P.J. Washington and Devonte’ Graham. The goal was for Hayward not to settle for midrange shots when there was a path to the basket.Mitchell hopes Hayward’s free-throw attempts will soon rival his career high of 6.1 during the 2014-15 season. He’s averaging 4.8 per game this season.“It’s almost to the point now where he’s pointing out the opportunities more than it is me,” Mitchell said.Noon — ‘I just like to cram some work in.’The coaches filled the middle of the game day as they saw fit. Iske played a shooting game with Surenkamp before finishing his scout of the Milwaukee Bucks, Charlotte’s opponent the following evening. Some, like Triano and Mitchell, took a brief nap, after having watched film late the previous night.Friedman squeezed in another workout before preparing for his next scout. “It’s hard for me to nap on game days,” he said. “I just like to cram some work in. It’s basketball at the end of the day, so you’re not really overworking yourself.”4:30 p.m. — ‘The best version of himself’Walk-through: The players and coaches gathered on the practice court for a walk-through of the night’s matchup. The session included an offensive breakdown, defensive scout and a review of plays. Then the assistants worked on the court with players, pulling some aside to watch quick video clips.Friedman played a short montage for guard Terry Rozier of his first start of the 2017-18 season, when he was with Boston. It was a triple-double effort against the Knicks. “It’s more for helping him envision the best version of himself right before we play,” Friedman said.7:10 p.m. — Tipoff vs. IndianaThe Hornets won the rematch, 108-105. “We made more plays down the stretch than we did the night before,” Borrego said, adding: “And I love this setup. I love playing two games against the same team in such a short period. This is a great way to teach.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Marty Schottenheimer, 77, Winning N.F.L. Coach With Four Teams, Dies

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyMarty Schottenheimer, 77, Winning N.F.L. Coach With Four Teams, DiesWith a running attack known as Martyball, his teams won 200 regular season games and reached the playoffs 13 times but never made it to the Super Bowl.Marty Schottenheimer coaching the  Cleveland Browns during the 1980s. He gained acclaim for turning around floundering teams. Credit…The Sporting News/Sporting News, via Getty ImagesFeb. 9, 2021Updated 3:01 p.m. ETMarty Schottenheimer, who won 200 regular-season games as an N.F.L. head coach, the eighth-highest total in league history, and took teams to the playoffs in 13 of his 21 seasons but never made it to the Super Bowl, died on Monday in Charlotte, N.C. He was 77. The cause was Alzheimer’s disease, said Bob Moore, a spokesman for the family. Schottenheimer died at a hospice facility near his home in Charlotte after being in its care since Jan. 30. He was first given a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s in 2014.Coaching four franchises with an often headstrong manner, Schottenheimer gained acclaim for turning around floundering teams, often emphasizing a power-running offense known as Martyball.At first, the tag was emblematic of his winning ways, at least in the regular season. But as the years passed, and Schottenheimer’s teams reached a conference final only three times and then lost all three games on that final rung toward the Super Bowl, Martyball became a term of derision, branding his offense as too conservative.Schottenheimer coached the original Cleveland Browns from midway through the 1984 season to 1988, the Kansas City Chiefs from 1989 to 1998, the Washington Redskins in 2001 (the team dropped that name last July) and the San Diego Chargers from 2002 to 2006.His teams went 200-126-1 over all, and he was named the 2004 N.F.L. coach of the year by The Associated Press when his Chargers went 12-4 after finishing the previous season at 4-12. But they were upset by the Jets in the first round of the playoffs.Schottenheimer’s squads had a 5-13 record in playoff games.In the run-up to the Chargers-Jets playoff game, Lee Jenkins of The New York Times, reflecting on Schottenheimer’s intensity, wrote how “anyone who watches Schottenheimer standing on the sideline Saturday night against the Jets, arms crossed and feet shoulder-width apart, will recognize him as that angry professor from Kansas City and Cleveland.”“He still wears his gold spectacles,” Jenkins wrote, “and sets his square jaw and roars his favorite football platitudes in a hoarse baritone that makes him sound as if he has been screaming for three and a half quarters.”Schottenheimer as head coach of the San Diego Chargers during a divisional playoff game in 2007. After the Chargers lost, he was fired.  Credit…Mike Blake/ReutersHue Jackson, an assistant to Schottenheimer with the Redskins and a future head coach of the Oakland Raiders and the second Cleveland Browns franchise, was struck by Schottenheimer’s football smarts coupled with an insistence on control.“My time with him, I watched one of the most passionate football coaches I had ever been around,” Jackson told ESPN in 2016. “I know everybody has the stories about Marty crying.”“He taught me a ton about the running game, being tough, just what it meant to be a part of a team,” Jackson recalled, adding, “Marty does not back down from anybody.”Martin Edward Schottenheimer was born on Sept. 23, 1943, in Canonsburg, Pa., near Pittsburgh, and grew up in nearby McDonald, a coal town, where his grandfather Frank, a German immigrant, had worked in the mines. His father, Edward, worked for a grocery chain, and his mother, Catherine (Dunbar) Schottenheimer, was a homemaker.Schottenheimer was considered one of the best high school defensive linemen in western Pennsylvania. He went on to the University of Pittsburgh, playing at linebacker from 1962 to 1964, and was named a second-team All-American by The Associated Press for his senior season.He was selected in the fourth round of the N.F.L.’s 1965 draft by the Baltimore Colts and in the seventh round of the American Football League draft by the Buffalo Bills.Schottenheimer, 6 feet 3 inches and 225 pounds, spent four seasons with the Bills and another two with the Boston Patriots.After working in real estate following his retirement as a player, he turned to coaching in the N.F.L. He spent two years as the Giants’ linebacker coach and then was their defensive coordinator in 1977. He coached the Detroit Lions’ linebackers for two seasons after that before becoming the Browns’ defensive coordinator. He succeeded Sam Rutigliano as the Browns’ head coach midway through the 1984 season, when they were 1-7.Relying on a power ground game featuring Earnest Byner and Kevin Mack and the passing of Bernie Kosar, Schottenheimer took the Browns to the American Football Conference final following the 1986 and 1987 seasons, but they lost to the Denver Broncos each time in their bid to reach the Super Bowl.The first time, the quarterback John Elway led the Broncos to a tying touchdown after they took over on their 2-yard line late in the fourth quarter, the sequence that became known as “the drive.” The Browns were then beaten on a field goal in overtime.The next year, in a play that became known as “the fumble,” Byner was stripped of the football just as he was about to cross the goal line for a potential game-tying touchdown with about a minute left. The Broncos took a safety and ran out the clock for a 38-33 victory.Schottenheimer’s 1988 Browns team went 10-6 and lost in the first round of the playoffs. At the time, his brother, Kurt, was the team’s defensive coordinator, and when the owner, Art Modell, insisted that he reassign his brother, Schottenheimer quit. He had also resisted Modell’s demand that he hire a new offensive coordinator, having filled that role himself when it become vacant that year.Schottenheimer was the first to admit that he was strong-willed.“Maybe I thought there was a pot of gold somewhere else to be found,” he said in his memoir, “Martyball!” (2012), written with Jeff Flanagan. “But I was stubborn, very stubborn back then. I’ve always been stubborn but much more so when I decided to leave Cleveland.”He then began a 10-season run as coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, taking them to the playoffs seven times.Before the 1993 season, the Chiefs obtained two of the N.F.L.’s marquee names, quarterback Joe Montana, in a trade, and running back Marcus Allen as a free agent. The team then went 11-5 and reached the A.F.C. final against the Bills. But Schottenheimer once again missed out on the Super Bowl. Montana left the game early in the second half with an injury, and the Bills rolled to a 30-13 victory.Schottenheimer as head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs in 1997. The team went to 13-3 in the regular season that year but lost to the Denver Broncos in the first round of the playoffs. Credit…Jed Jacobsohn/AllsportThe Chiefs were 13-3 in the 1997 regular season, only to lose to the Broncos in the playoffs’ first round. Schottenheimer was fired after the Chiefs went 7-9 in 1998, the only time one of his Kansas City teams finished below .500.After two years as an analyst for ESPN, Schottenheimer was hired as the Washington coach in 2001. He took the Redskins to an 8-8 record, then was fired once more.His last N.F.L. stop came in San Diego, where he twice lost in the playoffs’ first round, the second time following the Chargers’ 14-2 season in 2006 behind their brilliant running back LaDainian Tomlinson. In firing Schottenheimer after that season, the Chargers cited his feuding with the general manager, A.J. Smith, over control of roster decisions.Schottenheimer was coach and general manager of the Virginia Destroyers of the United Football League in 2011, taking them to the league title.He is survived by his wife, Pat (Hoeltgen) Schottenheimer; a son, Brian, who was a quarterback coach under him; a daughter, Kristen; his brothers Bill and Kurt; a sister, Lisa; and four grandchildren.Schottenheimer refused to second-guess decisions he had made in the playoffs or at any other time.“I’ve made calls that, by all reason, were perfect, and got nothing,” he once told The Boston Globe. “And I’ve made calls that were inappropriate to the situation and they’ve worked. So go figure. Pro football is a strange game.”Alex Traub contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Britt Reid, a Chiefs Assistant Coach, Is Involved in a Car Crash

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Super Bowl 2021Why the Chiefs Will WinTom Brady vs. Patrick MahomesA Super Bowl Trip Is Worth the Risk to Some Fans17 Recipes for Tiny TailgatesAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBritt Reid, a Chiefs Assistant Coach, Is Involved in a Car CrashThe team released a statement confirming that Reid, the son of Kansas City’s head coach, Andy Reid, had been in an accident but provided no other details.Coach Andy Reid with his son Britt, an assistant coach, after the Chiefs won the Super Bowl last year.Credit…Patrick Semansky/Associated PressKen Belson and Feb. 5, 2021Britt Reid, the outside linebackers coach for the Kansas City Chiefs and the son of the head coach, Andy Reid, was in an automobile crash on Thursday night, the team said in a statement Friday.The crash occurred just days before both men were expected to be in Tampa, Fla., for the Super Bowl on Sunday, when the Chiefs, the reigning N.F.L. champions, are scheduled to play the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The Chiefs were planning to fly to Tampa on Saturday, and it was not clear on Friday whether Britt Reid, 35, would make the trip.The team statement provided no details other than confirming that Reid had been involved in a crash.“We are in the process of gathering information, and we will have no further comment at this time,” the statement said.In response to an inquiry about a possible accident involving Britt Reid, a spokesman for the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department said that a crash had occurred on Interstate 435, which is not far from the Chiefs’ training facility. But the spokesman would not provide more details or identify anyone who was involved the crash, citing a Missouri law that prohibits the police from releasing the names of people who have not been charged with a crime.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      These Women Were N.F.L. ‘Firsts.’ They’re Eager for Company.

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Super Bowl 2021Chiefs Fans’ Generational DivideReconsidering Tom BradyToned Down TV CommercialsLuring Online Sports BettorsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThese Women Were N.F.L. ‘Firsts.’ They’re Eager for Company.Two women will coach the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in this year’s Super Bowl, a milestone in the N.F.L.’s gender diversity efforts. Women in football hope their presence quickly stops being noteworthy.Maral Javadifar, right, an assistant strength and conditioning coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Lori Locust, a defensive-line assistant, will coach in Super Bowl LV. It will be the first time that two coaches who are women will work the title game.Credit…Julio Cortez/Associated PressGillian R. Brassil and Feb. 3, 2021Updated 4:56 p.m. ETThe football pioneers arrived quickly over the past year: the first woman to coach in a Super Bowl, the first woman chosen to officiate a Super Bowl, the first Black woman to be named a full-time coach in the N.F.L.They can’t wait to have a lot more company.“What is really going to excite me is when this is no longer aberrational or when this is no longer something that’s noteworthy,” said Amy Trask, who in 1997 became the Oakland Raiders’ chief executive and the first woman of that rank in the N.F.L. Few have followed in similar roles.The coaching ranks took much longer to welcome women — until 2015. Eight female coaches were on N.F.L. staffs this season, the first time there had ever be more than two women coaching simultaneously in the league, according to The Institute of Diversity and Ethics in Sport, which tracks hiring across a variety of roles in five major sports.Other professional sports had groundbreaking moments, as well, in the past year. The Miami Marlins hired Kim Ng as M.L.B.’s first female general manager and Becky Hammon became the first woman to serve as a head coach in the N.B.A. But the ascent of women to top sports jobs remains an aberration and not the norm, as it is for men to lead many women’s professional and college teams.Jen Welter, the first female to coach in the N.F.L., said that she initially turned down her first opportunity to coach a men’s team — in the Champions Indoor Football league — because she worried about feeling isolated.“I was a highly decorated women’s player — two gold medals, an eight-time Pro Bowler — also had a master’s degree in sports psychology and a Ph.D. in psychology, and my instinct was, ‘no,’ because there were no women,” Welter said recently in a telephone interview. “Representation matters.”Callie Brownson, the chief of staff for the Cleveland Browns, said players were unfazed when she had to fill in as coach of the tight ends for two games this season and the wide receivers for one, when the full-time coaches for those positions were out on paternity leave or placed on the Covid-19 reserve list.“I remember walking up to the tight ends at practice on Wednesday and saying, ‘Hey, just so you guys know, I got you guys this weekend, I got you on game day,’” she recalled in a phone interview. “And it didn’t faze them at all, like: ‘Cool, OK, great, looking forward to it, let’s roll.’ That was powerful to me as a woman.”But, Brownson said, she has encountered resistance elsewhere. She recalled that at least one job interview felt like “checking a box,” and said that she had heard insulting quips — including “It’s funny to hear a woman talk about routes” — from men inside and outside the game.Like Trask, Brownson said: “I look forward to the days where we stop talking about how ‘she’s the first this’ and we’ve accomplished all those things, and women can just naturally fit into these coaching roles, scouting roles and operational roles.”Trask, who left the Raiders in 2013 after nearly 30 years in various jobs with the franchise and now serves as an analyst for CBS, recalled only a few moments when people questioned her role because of her gender.Once, she said, a reporter called out to Gene Upshaw, a Hall of Fame offensive lineman, at the end of a long practice: “Hey Gene, what’s it like having a girl on the team?”Trask recalled that Upshaw, who became the longtime leader of the N.F.L. players’ union, spun around and replied: “She’s not a girl. She’s a Raider.”Al Davis, the Raiders’ former team owner who hired Trask, also hired Tom Flores, the league’s first minority head coach to win a Super Bowl, and Art Shell, the first African-American head coach in the N.F.L. since the 1920s.“This was someone who hired without regard to race, gender or any other individuality, which has no bearing on whether someone can do a job,” Trask said of Davis, who initially hired her as an intern in 1983, when the team was based in Los Angeles and she was a law student who cold-called the Raiders’ headquarters seeking a job. “And he was doing this decades and decades before this was discussed as a subject within the football world, the sports world and much of the world in general.”Mold-breaking employees seem to be concentrated in certain organizations, such as the Raiders and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who will face the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl on Sunday. The Bucs will have a two female coaches on the field — Lori Locust, a defensive line assistant, and Maral Javadifar, an assistant strength and conditioning coach — just a year after the San Francisco 49ers’ Katie Sowers became the first woman to coach in a Super Bowl. Also on Sunday, Sarah Thomas will become the first woman to officiate the title game.Buccaneers Coach Bruce Arians, who made history by hiring Welter as an intern for the Arizona Cardinals in 2015, also has the only staff in the N.F.L. on which the offensive and defensive coordinators are both Black.“We support each other unconditionally,” Locust said of the women coaching in the N.F.L. “We may talk a little bit of trash — just a little bit while we’re playing one another — but it never gets malicious.”Credit…Daniel Kucin Jr./Associated PressThe league itself has pushed a number of diversity initiatives aimed at getting women and people of color into coaching positions over the years, including the Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship, which started in 1987, and the Women’s Careers in Football Forum, which began in 2017. Most of the N.F.L.’s female coaches were brought in through one of those programs.Some, like Jennifer King — recently promoted by the Washington Football Team to become the league’s first full-time Black female coach — have been supported financially by the Scott Pioli & Family Fund for Women Football Coaches and Scouts, named after the former longtime front office executive, and administered by the Women’s Sports Foundation.These pipelines have helped bring the handful of women coaching in the league together.“We support each other unconditionally,” said Locust of the Buccaneers. “We may talk a little bit of trash — just a little bit while we’re playing one another — but it never gets malicious.”Though the women hope their ranks keep expanding, the limited racial diversify in the league’s coaching ranks suggests a possibility of backsliding. The highest number of nonwhite N.F.L. head coaches at any given time has been eight — last reached in 2018, matching the current total of women with coaching jobs. Now, in a league in which about 70 percent of the players are Black, only three of the current head coaches are, and only two others meet the N.F.L.’s standard for diversity hiring. The N.F.L. did not respond to multiple interview requests for this article.Yet as women in the N.F.L. hope for the days when they are no longer groundbreakers, they appreciate the progress that this weekend represents. Thomas, the Super Bowl official, was part of the N.F.L.’s first pregame handshake involving two women: Her first game — a preseason matchup in 2015 — was also Welter’s debut with the Cardinals.“I always think about that handshake as basically like a deal or a promise,” Welter said recently, “that this is going to continue, that more women will have opportunities to have that handshake.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      In N.F.L., the Same Old Line and Verse About Hiring Black Coaches

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storySPORTS OF THE TIMESIn N.F.L., the Same Old Line and Verse About Hiring Black CoachesIn the latest hiring cycle, Eric Bieniemy, the Kansas City Chiefs’ offensive coordinator, watched from the sideline as white peers were chosen as head coaches.Eric Bieniemy, the Kansas City Chiefs’ offensive coordinator, will coach in his second consecutive Super Bowl on Sunday.Credit…Mark Brown/Getty ImagesFeb. 1, 2021, 3:00 a.m. ETThe N.F.L. can’t hide its Eric Bieniemy problem with poetry.The league announced last week that Amanda Gorman, America’s first youth poet laureate, whose soaring verse on a nation rived by race and conflict enthralled viewers of President Biden’s inauguration, would deliver a pregame poem at the Super Bowl on Sunday.On the one hand, that’s terrific news. Gorman’s way with words is a tonic we need right now.On the other hand, beware. Pro football’s embrace of a young Black woman like Gorman — coming on the heels of its sudden, forced support of Black Lives Matter after the killing of George Floyd — is part of a public-relations campaign that obscures troubling reality.The N.F.L. now sells itself as a champion for equality. But where change is needed most, it remains stuck in the stinging days of old.Black players make up about 70 percent of N.F.L. rosters, meaning they provide the bulk of the entertainment. Yet whites hold the power, and won’t let go. No Black team ownership. A sprinkle of Black faces in upper management. It took until 1989 for the N.F.L. to hire a Black coach for the first time in the league’s modern era. Not much has changed: Now there are three.The story, or, rather, the shameful passing over of Bieniemy, the offensive coordinator who helped power the Kansas City Chiefs to consecutive Super Bowls, puts a fine point on it. He is the best known, and most talked about, head coaching candidate in a small cluster of African-American coordinators in the N.F.L. But he continues to watch from the sideline as his white peers are chosen to lead teams.In the latest round of head coach hiring, there were seven openings. Seven opportunities for the N.F.L. to stand behind the slogans like “End Racism” that now line its fields and adorn its helmets. Seven chances, and Bieniemy was shut out again.What more can he do? His squad marched through the N.F.L. playoffs as if its opponents were stick figures. One more win, and he’s got back-to-back Super Bowl rings.The star quarterback Patrick Mahomes talks up Bieniemy every chance he gets. Andy Reid, the Chiefs’ head coach, says he’s a rare and gifted leader. Given Reid’s stature in the N.F.L., that’s like a blessing from God.Yet Reid continues to be dumbstruck at how his second in command keeps being overlooked. “I’m glad I have him, but I’m not so glad I have him,” Reid said last week. “I was really hoping he would have an opportunity to take one of these jobs. He would be great for any number of teams.”So why can’t Bieniemy get a fair shake?Naysayers claim he doesn’t call plays. But Reid and Mahomes say that’s not true. And when has not calling plays been an obstacle for white assistants hired to steer teams?Another chorus claims Bieniemy doesn’t interview or communicate well. But that belies his calm, sure manner while addressing reporters. Besides, plenty of white coaches seem incapable of expressing themselves clearly.Some say Bieniemy has not been hired because of brushes with the law that took place decades ago — including a fight in college after he was called a racial slur and an arrest on a drunken-driving charge in 2001. But this ventures into double standards for a league notorious for overlooking violent misdeeds off field with its players and blemishes with its white coaches.Does Bieniemy, 51, a former player in his 15th year as an N.F.L. assistant, somehow need more experience? Then how do we explain a league currently in love with a new prototype: the young white coach trumpeted for his genius despite little on his résumé. Consider the Los Angeles Chargers’ new coach, 38-year-old Brandon Staley. In 2016, he was an assistant coach at Division III’s John Carroll University. Now he holds the reins of an N.F.L. team.So much for experience when you look like an N.F.L. owner’s grandson.For a long while, during this same-as-it-ever-was hiring cycle, it looked as if it would be a complete shutout for Black coaches. Then, with one last job available, the Houston Texans hired the Baltimore assistant David Culley.Culley is 65. You read that right: retirement age, and he’s only now getting his first lead job in the league. He has been coaching for roughly 40 years. Is that really what it takes? Four decades of toil? It’s important to understand how discrimination alters pathways for N.F.L. assistants. But there’s another, less talked about worry: the stifling effect on the ambition of Black coaches all the way down the pipeline.Charles Adams is just one example.A few months back, I wrote about Adams and his journey as an African-American police officer and head coach at Minneapolis North high school. He inherited a struggling team from the toughest part of his city, turned it into a perennial power and won a state title. When you watch the Super Bowl and see the Tampa Bay Buccaneers rookie Tyler Johnson catching passes from Tom Brady, know that it was Adams who guided the young receiver through high school and still mentors him today.When we spoke recently, Adams told me how he used to imagine latching on with a college team and working up the ladder from there. Maybe the pros. Maybe head coach. Why not? For years, he applied for an N.F.L. fellowship that sends Black coaches to training camps so they can network and soak up knowledge. He never got a response.That’s a stinging blow. Seeing Bieniemy being constantly overlooked is another. Together the message is awful. Don’t think too big.“For many of us, it becomes ‘Why bother?’” Adams said.That’s the overlooked tragedy. Ambitious white coaches look at the N.F.L., see plenty of open lanes and keep charging forward. Ambitious Black coaches see roadblocks and dead ends — and often dim their expectations.The cycle continues. An age-old American tale.It will be great to see Amanda Gorman recite poetry at the Super Bowl. But when you do, think of Bieniemy and all the coaches who look like him. Think of their hopes and frustrations — of their dreams deferred, again and again.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More