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After his team’s first victory earlier this month, University of Colorado football coach Deion Sanders said something remarkable. He talked bluntly about racism and football in a way that few Black coaches at an elite level are willing to do.
“We’re doing things that have never been done, and that makes people uncomfortable,” Sanders said. “When you see a confident Black man sitting up here talking his talk, walking his walk, coaching 75% African Americans in the locker room, that’s kind of threatening. Oh, they don’t like that.”
We know what Sanders’ critics say. He’s got a big mouth. He plays the race card when he should just coach football. His “hype train is about to derail.”
But as at least one columnist has noted, Sanders also embodies the “audacious Blackness” that so many African Americans hunger for right now.
Black America’s embrace of Sanders and his team is now well-documented. One Black commentator has compared him to Muhammad Ali. Numerous Black celebrities, from rappers Master P and Lil Wayne to LA Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard and actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, have made appearances at his games.
