Overall, last week’s eight playoff teams averaged 35 points. Offense is the way teams are winning now. To that end, NFL owners are looking for coaches that are well versed in running high-powered offenses. Of the eight head coaching openings this off-season, seven have been filled with coaches with offensive play-calling backgrounds.
So where does that leave African-American coaches? The most common place to find an NFL coach is by looking at top coordinators. With the way the league’s headed, offensive coordinators are the applicants getting the most attention. But there’s currently only one African-American offensive coordinator in the NFL, Jim Caldwell of the Baltimore Ravens. And he only got the position after former offensive coordinator Cam Cameron was fired after Week 13.
The only other African-American offensive coordinator last season was the Buffalo Bill’s Curtis Modkins, who was also the running backs coach. He didn’t actually call the offensive plays though, and he was recently hired by the Detroit Lions to coach their running backs. The problem is most African-American coaches come from defensive backgrounds.
Another issue might be that there aren’t many African-American offensive candidates in the pipeline. NFL owners also look to hire top college coaches every year, and last year there were 15 African-American coaches heading college programs. There’s certainly been progress, as there were only three black head coaches a decade ago, but there’s still plenty of work to do. There’s a total of 125 college head coaching jobs, so 15 isn’t exactly eye opening.
There are solid candidates in Stanford’s David Shaw and Louisville’s Charlie Strong, but they both seem content at their current positions.






