King Kaufman's Sports Daily

McNabb says black quarterbacks face more criticism. Amazingly, there are arguments over this. Plus: Vote on Barry's HR ball here!

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Sept. 20, 2007 | Donovan McNabb told HBO's "Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel" this week that black quarterbacks face greater scrutiny and more criticism than white quarterbacks.

Asked if whites such as Peyton Manning and Carson Palmer face the same level of criticism, McNabb said, "Let me start by saying, I love those guys. But they don't get criticized as much as we do. They don't."

Could it be McNabb isn't controlling for the fact that he plays in Philadelphia?

Probably not. The reaction to McNabb has been predictable and customary. On one side, the "don't be ridiculous" crowd. On the other: "Well, duh."

The first crowd brings out the numbers. There are six black starting quarterbacks in the NFL right now, would have been seven if Michael Vick hadn't decided to run a criminal enterprise on the side. And it's just a matter of time before Byron Leftwich replaces Joey Harrington in Atlanta and Daunte Culpepper replaces Josh McCown in Oakland.

And the eventual new guy in Oakland, JaMarcus Russell, wasn't he a black quarterback, the top draft pick, 21 spots ahead of golden boy -- actually kind of a light beige, like the 26 other starting quarterbacks -- Brady Quinn?

The other side asks, how it can be that the assessment of NFL quarterbacks is the one corner of American life where society is colorblind? That's my side.

"There are not that many African-American quarterbacks, so we have to do a little bit extra," McNabb told James Brown in the interview. "The percentage of us playing this position, which people didn't want us to play, is low. So we do a little extra."

He gave an example: "I pass for 300 yards, our team wins by seven, and it's, 'Oh, he could have made this throw here. We would have scored more points if he would have done this.'"

Sounds a little whiney, doesn't it? But that doesn't make it not true. As Jason Whitlock pointed out on Foxsports.com, McNabb has taken shots from every corner despite a fine career during which he's had exactly one elite receiver to throw to, and that receiver was Terrell Owens, a jackpot in the be careful what you wish for lottery.

Two years ago the president of the Philadelphia chapter of the NAACP criticized McNabb for abandoning his scrambling ways and becoming more of a pocket passer, which J. Whyatt Mondesire wrote in his newspaper column was a "breach of faith" because it amounted to McNabb trying to "disguise" his mediocrity "behind some concocted reasoning that African American quarterbacks who can scramble and who can run the ball are somehow lesser field generals."

Next page: The CFL's all-time leading passer backs McNabb. Plus: Vote here on Bonds home run No. 756 ball