Star Black quarterbacks no longer are the exception – they’re the rule. Throughout the football season, this series will explore the prominence and impact of Black QBs from the grassroots level to the NFL.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – For years, sportswriters contacted Black quarterback pioneers James “Shack” Harris and Doug Williams, seeking comment each time a young, African American passer led a team to the NFL playoffs for the first time.
Aware of the cultural significance of Black men thriving at the most important position in sports – a position that, historically, was off limits to them – the journalists gained insight and context from Harris and Williams about a seismic shift occurring on the field.
Then, suddenly, reporters stopped calling. So many Black men have become star QBs, Williams explained, their rise to the top of the league is no longer a novelty.
“What you have now is that they’re part of the fabric of the game,” Williams told Andscape recently. “When you look across the league today, you see these guys are everywhere, leading their teams to the playoffs, [to the] Super Bowl, winning [awards] … it’s just obvious. What you’ve got is a new day. It’s not going back, so everybody just needs to get used to it.”
Welcome to the Era of the Black Quarterback.
AP Photo/Elise Amendola
As the NFL this week prepares to kick off its 105th season with the Kansas City Chiefs playing host to the Baltimore Ravens in Thursday’s season opener, African American passers now run the most successful and powerful league in professional sports. Sidelined until relatively recently because of racism, players who once supposedly lacked the smarts and leadership skills to play the position are excelling on the strength of their intellect, determination and physical gifts. They’re seizing opportunities while standing on the shoulders of Harris, Williams and other trailblazers. What’s more, the unprecedented reordering of things on the field has forced the NFL to adjust off of it writ large, because influential Black quarterbacks are Black men first.
Among active QBs, Patrick Mahomes of the Chiefs stands alone.
At only 28, Mahomes is not only the face of the game, he’s also already an all-time great. With a playoff mark of 15-3, he trails only Tom Brady and Joe Montana, who have 35 and 16 postseason victories, respectively, on the career list.
Mahomes is a two-time Associated Press NFL MVP, and both a three-time Super Bowl winner and a three-time Super Bowl MVP. Last season, the Chiefs became the first team since the New England Patriots in 2004 and 2005 to win back-to-back Super Bowl championships (no team in the Super Bowl era has won three straight titles).
For the second time in five seasons, Lamar Jackson, 27, of the Ravens won the AP MVP Award. Houston Texans QB C.J. Stroud, 22, the AP Offensive Rookie of the Year, is widely regarded as one of the league’s best newcomers in years. Cleveland Browns three-time Pro Bowler Deshaun Watson, 28, has the biggest guaranteed contract in NFL history. After his breakout first season as a starter, Jordan Love, 25, of the Green Bay Packers received an NFL record $75 million signing bonus as part of his new deal. Additionally, in the last two seasons, African American signal-callers were selected first- and second-team AP All-Pro.
And there’s no shortage of talent in the pipeline.
During each of the past two NFL drafts, Black QBs were selected first overall, and three were picked in the opening round. On the ESPN 300 ranking of high school football players in the class of 2025, the top two spots are occupied by Black QBs.
There have been 88 NFL drafts (the league’s first was in 1936), during which only 31 Black passers were selected in the first round, and none were until Williams finally kicked down the door in 1978. But 19 have been chosen since 2011, including one in every draft except 2016 and 2022.
| Black quarterbacks starting on opening day this season
An NFL record 15 Black quarterbacks will open the NFL season behind center, breaking the previous mark of 14 Week 1 starters set in the 2023-24 season. Jacoby Brissett (New England Patriots) |
From the grassroots level up, the structure is in place for Black quarterbacks to have a long reign, renowned quarterback coach Quincy Avery told Andscape.
“For the first time, we’ve seen a generation of Black kids who have gotten the opportunity to play quarterback since they were seven, eight years old,” said Avery, who counts Cleveland’s Watson and Jalen Hurts, 26, runner-up for the 2022-23 AP MVP award, of the Philadelphia Eagles among his clients.
“When they were the best athletes on the field in the past, they were told, ‘No. You can’t be the quarterback.’ It was just understood. But no longer. Now, there are no limitations on them. Since they were kids, they’ve expected to get the opportunities to play.
“So when we turn on our TVs today, we’re seeing this generation that has benefited from knowing they have always been quarterbacks and would be quarterbacks all the way up the line. And the kids who are coming behind them, they now see a league full of Black quarterbacks with more on the way.”
Scott Taetsch/Getty Images
The influx of talent over the past decade is evident by who’s atop NFL depth charts.
Of the league’s 32 teams, 15 are projected to have Black starting quarterbacks — a record that eclipses last season’s record of 14. That group includes 10 former first-round picks. The AFC North is a haven for Black exceptionalism at the position: Three of the division’s four teams (Baltimore, Cleveland and the Pittsburgh Steelers) have African Americans listed as starters and primary backups.
Years ago, Williams saw into the future.
The first Black passer to start in the Super Bowl and be selected the game’s MVP, Williams shattered racists myths while leading the then-Washington Redskins to a 42-10 victory over the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXII. Williams envisioned a day when at least half of the NFL’s teams would be led by quarterbacks of color, “but it’s even happening faster than I thought,” Williams said. “You have so many talented guys coming from college, and these teams can’t [pass on] anyone who can play this game and help them win. It’s not like before, when most guys had to change positions if they wanted to play in the NFL.”
What changed?
It’s simple: green finally trumped Black.
As the NFL’s revenue grew to billions of dollars annually, it became a league in which coaches and general managers have deals that pay out many millions annually in salary, bonuses and perks. For that type of investment in their football people, franchise owners expect big results. Quickly. Over time, it became untenable for coaches to force talented college QBs to move to other positions solely because of one’s degree of melanin.
As a player and as an NFL player-personnel executive, Harris had an outsized role in spurring positive change. The trailblazer holds the distinction of being the first Black quarterback to start in a season opener during the modern era of major pro football in the United States. Harris also became the first Black signal-caller to start in and win a playoff game.
After his playing days ended, Harris made a long, steady climb from being a scout to a front-office official for several clubs. Harris helped build the Baltimore Ravens’ 2001 Super Bowl championship team. He was the vice president of player personnel for the Jacksonville Jaguars. In 2015, Harris retired from his role as a senior personnel adviser with the Detroit Lions.
Whenever Harris watches NFL games these days, a sense of pride washes over him “because there are just so many of these young guys doing great things all over the league now … and it makes you feel like everything you went through may have just helped move the ball along a little,” Harris told Andscape. “We’ve seen this building for a while now, we’ve seen years where there was [significant] progress, but not like this. This is new.”
During the 2019-2020 season, Black players at the position accomplished more than they had at any point previously. Of course, that season could have been a one-off. Williams’ myth-busting Super Bowl performance in 1988, for example, didn’t result in an immediate leveling of the playing field. NFL decision-makers still weren’t convinced that Black men were the future at quarterback.
“We’ve seen this building for a while now, we’ve seen years where there was [significant] progress, but not like this. This is new.”
— Black QB pioneer James “Shack” Harris
Over the past four seasons, however, Black quarterbacks have shone while their ranks have continued to grow. With their newfound clout, two played a key role in pressuring the league to support social justice causes.
As the murder of George Floyd galvanized the social justice movement in 2020, Mahomes and Watson were among a group of more than a dozen Black NFL stars who pushed club owners to acknowledge past wrongs and truly stand with them. The group released a powerful video in which it asked those at the highest levels of the NFL to admit they erred in their response to peaceful NFL player protests of police brutality and systemic oppression, condemn racism and affirm that Black Lives Matter. In an equally remarkable response only a day later, commissioner Roger Goodell checked the items on the players’ to-do list, even saying, “Black Lives Matter.”
The stunning shift in the league’s public stance on the peaceful protest movement occurred because some of its Black stars — and especially Black quarterbacks — drew a line in the sand. Mahomes’ involvement in the video could not be overstated, several league officials told Andscape at the time.
Mahomes, only 24 when he participated in the video, ventured deeper into controversial societal issues directly impacting the Black experience in America more than any top-of-the-game quarterback. Part of the reason: Never before had an African American passer been the league’s consensus No. 1 player in any era.
Mahomes had skin in the game. Literally.
Ken Blaze/USA TODAY Sports
Indicative of their standing, Black QBs are at the center of some of the league’s most intriguing storylines entering the 2024-25 season.
Surely, the Chiefs’ quest to set a new standard for achievement in the Super Bowl era by winning three consecutive championships will dominate the spotlight. Make no mistake, Mahomes is driven to accomplish something Brady – who with seven Super Bowl titles is the most successful QB ever – did not.
It would be ludicrous to argue that the Ravens-Jackson union has been anything but a major win-win. Jackson is only the fifth player to receive multiple MVP awards in his first six seasons in the NFL. The others were Jim Brown, Kurt Warner, Brett Favre and Mahomes. Talk about being in impressive company.
Five times, Jackson has led Baltimore to the postseason. Twice during that span, the Ravens have had the AFC’s No. 1 overall seeding. Problem is, Jackson is 2-4 in the playoffs. Despite having a defense that ranked among the greatest in league history last season – Baltimore became the first NFL team to record the fewest points allowed per game (16.5), the most sacks (60) and the most takeaways (31) – the Ravens fell to the visiting Chiefs in the AFC Championship Game. Jackson is yet to prove he can lead a team to the Super Bowl.
After Stroud’s sensational rookie year, the Texans added All-Pro wide receiver Stefon Diggs. Is Houston ready to challenge the Chiefs, Ravens or others for the top spot in the AFC?
Once, Kyler Murray, 27, of the Arizona Cardinals seemed on track to be a perennial MVP candidate. In his first three seasons, Murray, drafted first overall out of Oklahoma in 2019, was the AP Offensive Rookie of the Year and a two-time Pro Bowler. Then, he suffered a knee injury that cut short his 2022-23 season. Following surgery and rehab, Murray played in eight games last season. If he’s all the way back this season, the Cardinals are a different team.
In a stunning draft move, the Atlanta Falcons used the eighth overall pick to select Michael Penix Jr. from Washington. Only a little more than a month earlier during free agency, the Falcons guaranteed veteran passer Kirk Cousins $100 million. Clearly, Penix is the Falcons’ QB of the future. Question is, despite the money owed to Cousins, is the future now?
Then there’s Watson.
Since being traded from Houston to Cleveland, Watson has struggled with injuries and ineffectiveness. He also was inactive for every game in the 2021-22 season, his last with the Texans, while facing sexual harassment allegations (he was not charged criminally). With all of that, it’s easy to forget that Watson once was an elite player.
Apparently, many Browns fans would agree.
On sports-talk radio and on social media in particular, their ire is directed at Watson, who led the NFL in passing yards during the 2020-21 season. Presumably, their frustration is as much a product of Watson’s lack of production as his record-setting, $230-million contract. This season may provide Watson with his final chance to get The Dawg Pound on his side.
Although Black quarterbacks have ascended to positions of once-unfathomable power and prestige, they’re still not immune from occasionally facing wrongheaded, coded criticism common in the game’s past.
In The Athletic’s annual survey ranking NFL quarterbacks in 2022, Mahomes and Jackson received anonymous criticism that, in Mahomes’ opinion, harkened back to a bad time for the league.
“I mean, obviously the Black quarterback has had [to] battle to be in this position to have this many guys in the league playing, and every day we’re proving that we should have been playing the whole time,” Mahomes said on behalf of Black QBs past, present and future. “We’ve got guys that think just as well as they use their athleticism.
“So it always is weird when you see guys like me, Lamar, Kyler kind of get that [narrative] on them and other guys don’t. But at the same time, we’re going to go out there every day and show that we can be some of the best quarterbacks in the league.”
They’ve done that so well, Williams said, there’s no longer a need to denote a Black quarterback’s race each time one accomplishes something significant.
“We’ve got to put that part of it to rest,” Williams said. “When guys win awards, get teams to the playoffs, the Super Bowl, whatever, we don’t have to mention that anymore. Just focus on [the achievements]. With so many talented guys everywhere, trust me, there’s gonna be enough to talk about.”
It sure seems so. Might be wise for Williams and Harris to keep their phones handy again.