For Doug Williams, the first Black QB to start a Super Bowl, the road to reach that moment was brutal
The 1979 Bucs jumped out to a 5-0 start. Win No. 5 pitted Williams against Evans, who started for the Bears. As Williams hurtled the Bucs toward the playoffs, the Bucs, like the Dodgers three decades before, became Black America’s team. Tampa Bay loved Williams, it seemed, as long as his interceptions didn’t cost the team games. When Evans got sidetracked after Williams beat him, Williams began to fully feel the pressure of being the NFL’s only Black starting quarterback.
Williams apologized for lashing out. McKay stuck with him and Williams led the Bucs to a home NFC championship game with the Rams. But his coach couldn’t fully shield him from the intense pressure he felt by season’s end. When reporters pointed to his performance at Dallas in which Williams had two interceptions, the coach said: “And he had five passes dropped. So that gives sportswriters a chance to say what a poor quarterback and passer he is. It’ll just give another racist a chance to say that Doug is not good, and I’m getting sick of it.”or something worse.
When the Oklahoma Outlaws of the United States Football League, a rival to the NFL, met his asking price in a multiyear deal, Williams took it. “Things were getting sticky down there even before the contract thing came up,” he said. “There was a lot of tension. Some of the fans began getting on me. You know, people get on the quarterback everywhere when they think you should be winning more. But there were a lot of racial things yelled out. I really heard them on the sidelines. There was this one guy who seemed to pay his money just to remind me what color I was.
Gibbs acted on a hunch and called Williams, now 31, offering him a shot at being Jay Schroeder’s backup in 1986. Tampa Bay traded his rights to Washington for a fifth-round draft pick.
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