Black Coach Choke (aka BCC)

I coined the phrase Black Coach Choke (BCC) several years ago, and have explained many times but never posted on the blog. What is the Black Coach Choke? The simplest explanation: It is the moment when a team is heavily favored going into a championship or major prime time game and they lose and the team has a Black Head Coach. Obviously, losing as a favorite is something that happens to coaches of all races. What I have seen in Black Coaches is that failure is not a result of them not being a good coach. What I have witnessed is that the failure seems to come out of a sense of loyalty. They simply expect their superstars to do what they always do and that will be enough. Almost an arrogance, if we play our game we will win. Problem is oftentimes superstars don't do what they always do under pressure. At that point it is the coach who needs to force the issue, not trust that things will work out. To be fair, I do not attribute this to every Black Coach that loses one of these games. When Mike Tomlin's Steelers lost to the Packers in the Super Bowl. I attributed that to the Packers having the better team. Plus Tomlin has won in that situation before. I think this started for me with Dusty Baker, back when he managed the Chicago Cubs team with Wood & Prior as the #1 & #2 pitchers and loss the World Series. Baker basically asserted if I get my 2 "aces" to pitch 4 games we will win. Dusty believed his superstars would come through. Problem is they failed. They failed because to accomplish this, he had to change the regular rotation and make them pitch on less rest than they had normally. Seemed to make sense as they were young and un-hittable, but on short rest they became very hittable. This continued with coaches like Tony Dungy. One has to ask how is it the team he coached in Tampa Bay was excellent perennially, but failed to make a Super Bowl. Then after he left someone else coaches the team and wins the Super Bowl. Another coach won with the team that Dungy built. It was the Black Coach Choke in its purest form. Jon Gruden (who replaced Dungy) basically came in and said we are going to protect ourselves from our potential weaknesses and not try to overcome them. Tony Dungy went on to the Indianapolis Colts and with one of the NFL's best QB's he continued to fail at the highest level. Fortunately for Dungy he made it into a Super Bowl and played against another Black Coach Lovie Smith for the Chicago Bears. The trust that Lovie Smith showed for his QB Rex Grossman is about the purest match to my explanation of the Black Coach Choke there ever could be. The fact that he could lead a team to a Super Bowl with a QB playing as poorly as Rex Grossman (nicknamed Train Rex) is a testament of how great a coach he is. His failure is only explainable by the Black Coach Choke. A sense of trust or arrogance that believed they could overcome those shortcomings or an unrealistic expectation that Train Rex could never meet. I still believe Tony Dungy would have never won a Super Bowl if he had not benefited himself from the BCC. Someone had to win! There is no argument that Dungy is one of the NFL's greatest coaches. His accomplishments are plentiful, he has even birthed a number of successful coaches out of his coaching system. The only logical (or maybe we should call it illogical) explanation for his lack of even greater achievement is the BCC?