By: Bowen Deng
September 17, 2024
Photo Credit: Amazon Prime Video
The NFL is always looking to boost its product and expand the league’s cultural impact beyond the field of play. In 2023, the NFL partnered with Netflix to release a behind-the-scenes docuseries for the first time ever. Aptly named Quarterback, the series featured Patrick Mahomes, Kirk Cousins, and Marcus Mariota, highlighting their lives on and off the field during the 2022-2023 NFL season. This year, the NFL continued their venture into sports documentaries with Netflix's Receiver, following George Kittle, Deebo Samuel, Davante Adams, and Amon-Ra St. Brown in the same fashion during the 2023-2024 season.
Both shows were highly successful, and now, the NFL will seek to continue this trend with the release of Evolution of the Black Quarterback, premiering on Amazon Prime Video on Tuesday, September 24th, 2024.
The series follows former NFL star quarterback Michael Vick as he travels the United States and interviews many prominent Black quarterbacks of the past and present. In doing so, Vick aims to chronologically examine the history of the Black quarterbacks in the NFL, the challenges they had to face on and off the field, and their past and present accomplishments in the NFL. In addition to Vick himself, notable former Black quarterbacks slated to appear in the series include Donovan McNabb, Warren Moon, and Doug Williams, while Patrick Mahomes, Jalen Hurts, and Lamar Jackson will highlight the current generation of Black signal callers in professional football.
While the NFL’s prior Netflix series focused on the daily lives and game day preparation for players, this Amazon Prime Video docuseries primarily serves as a way to increase the awareness of football fans in regard to a crucial, often overlooked part of NFL history. From the onset of the NFL-AFL merger in 1966, the quarterback position was viewed by the establishment of the league within a damaging racial stereotype. Quarterback was seen as a position "too complex” for Black athletes to play at a professional level. Coming out of college, Black quarterbacks have long been encouraged to switch to different positions by NFL GMs and scouts, something Heisman Trophy winner and eventual two-time NFL MVP Lamar Jackson himself experienced during the pre-draft process in the spring of 2018. In fact, many of these players were taken off draft boards entirely if they refused to switch positions. The 1980s saw an increase in Black quarterbacks, with Randall Cunningham and Warren Moon making names for themselves in the NFL as star signal callers. In many ways, this period laid the foundation for the quarterbacks of the 21st century.
This docuseries is being released at a fitting time, as 15 Black quarterbacks started in Week One of the 2024-2025 NFL season, a league record. Evolution of the Black Quarterback will provide valuable insight into how the landscape of the NFL has changed over the years to become more inclusive, specifically at the most important and publicly visible position in the sport.
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