Bill Polian on Lamar Jackson: “He’s short and not the thrower the other guys are.” pic.twitter.com/cEMHBt32bU
— Anthony Raia (@anthonyraia_) February 19, 2018
Bill Polian said on ESPN’s NFL Live that, if he were the Eagles’ GM, he wouldn’t listen to any offers for Nick Foles unless they started with “two 1’s and two 2’s.”
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) February 19, 2018
I am not even going to get into the ridiculous thoughts that Bill Polian is talking about (you can see two above). Instead, I am going to explain to you why Polian has a job.
It is the same reason Mike Ditka had a job at ESPN for so long. There is a segment of the ESPN audience that is very old and white.
They need someone to appeal to them, that is where the Ditkas and Polians come into play.
The old guard is what they call it.
You think 75-year-old Bill Polian is watching hours of Lamar Jackson tape? He is an old man that sees a fast black guy and throws a bunch of Laura Ingraham stereotypes on him and goes about his day. I am not calling him racist, he is just ignorant because he doesn’t know any better, this is what he has been taught in the NFL, so it isn’t surprising he spews this type of racially insensitive comments on TV.
There are many old white people who feel the same. It is ok to think Lamar Jackson won’t be a star or even a good quarterback in the NFL, it is a totally another thing just to say racial stereotypes because that is all you know.
The hypocrisy is in plain sight, there is no deep reasoning behind the statements, just I am old, I have done this for a long time, so I know what I am talking about.
It is no different from Trump going on twitter and just saying whatever comes to his head with no research and simply not caring he said something different about same issue years, months, weeks or days before.
This is not to take away from Polian’s accomplishments, but he isn’t putting in the work, he is just a name people recognize and old white people can say “yep” to, nothing more, nothing less.
It is the same reason Will Cain was implemented to appease younger MAGA viewers. It’s business at the end of the day, and we are talking about Polian, so in that regard, ESPN wins, but it is sad that in 2018 a black quarterback who has accomplished a lot is being told not ever to try to be successful at his chosen position because of the color of his skin.
That sounds like something that would have been said when Polian was in his heyday………….wait.