List of Black starting NFL quarterbacks

This list of Black starting NFL quarterbacks includes those who have started in a regular-season or post-season game in the National Football League (NFL). The quarterback is the leader of a team's offense, directing other players on the field.^[1][2] Some authors have contended that Black players have been excluded from playing quarterback in the NFL because of the belief that white players would not follow their leadership and the perception that Black quarterbacks lack intelligence, dependability, composure, character, or charisma.^[3][4] Promising Black quarterbacks at the high school and college levels were often transitioned at the professional level to other positions, such as running back or wide receiver.^[5][6][7] While a ban on Black players in the NFL ended in 1946,^[1] the quarterback position was among the last to be desegregated.^[2]

Although Black quarterbacks and other quarterbacks of color vary in physical size and playing style,^[8] racial stereotyping persists.^[9][10] A 2015 study found that even when controlling for various factors, Black quarterbacks are twice as likely to be "benched", or removed from play, as white quarterbacks.^[11] Other studies have found that sports broadcasters are more likely to attribute a Black quarterback's success to superior athletic attributes and a white quarterback's success to superior intellect.^[12][13] It was not until 2017, when the New York Giants started Geno Smith in place of the benched Eli Manning,^[14] that all 32 active NFL teams had started at least one Black quarterback.^[15] That year, nearly 70% of NFL players, but only 25% of starting quarterbacks, were Black.^[6] 16 of the league's 32 starting quarterbacks were Black at the start of the 2025 NFL season, the most in a single week in NFL history.^[16]

Racial antagonism should have no place in football, but unhappily the millennium has not yet arrived. Unscrupulous opponents did their best to knock Brown's gritty colored star cold. They were out to 'get' Pollard and they weren't too particular with how they got him. No white man would have had to take the punishment Pollard did.

The quarterback position has changed over the years and did not exist in its modern form in the early 20th century. In the early days of football, quarterbacks were called upon to throw the ball, run the ball, and kick the ball; the forward pass was not adopted widely until the 1930s. However, tailbacks who played in the single-wing formation are "the equivalent of a modern-day quarterback"^[18] or "the closest thing to it."^[1]

Single-wing tailback Fritz Pollard, a key figure in the early days of the NFL, became the league's first Black quarterback when he started playing the position for the Hammond Pros in 1923.^[1] By that time, he had already become the first Black head coach in the NFL, and prior to his professional career, the first Black quarterback All-American and the first to appear in the Rose Bowl. Pollard faced racism throughout his career, including from his teammates. In college, fans were reported to sing "Bye Bye Blackbird" when he took the field. Pollard would sometimes have to enter the field through a separate gate, or be driven onto the field in a car for his own safety, in order to avoid fans who chanted "kill the nigger" and threw bottles and bricks at him. After retiring from football, Pollard started the first Black tabloid newspaper, the New York Independent News.^[20] In 2005, Pollard was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.^[1][21]

The demise of the competing American Football League (AFL) in the 1920s left a "glut of available white players eager to sign on with the NFL, rendering Black players expendable."^[1] In 1926, there were five Black players in the NFL, in 1927 only one. With the onset of the Great Depression in the 1930s, economic pressures led to a further deterioration of race relations, and minorities were often vilified and scapegoated. When the Chicago Cardinals signed Joe Lillard in 1932, the same year a rule change expanded the forward pass and Franklin Delano Roosevelt won the US presidency with 75% of the Black vote, he was the NFL's only Black player at the time. Lillard started 12 games with the Chicago Cardinals, and although he threw passes, ran the ball, kicked the ball, and returned punts, he was used sparingly as a quarterback.^[1][22]

1932年は、人種隔離主義者のジョージ・プレストン・マーシャルがボストン・ブレーブスを創設した年でもあった。翌年、マーシャルはブレーブスをボストン・レッドスキンズに改名し、NFL全体で黒人選手の出場を禁止する協定を仲介した。ジョー・リラードは放出され、1934年までにNFLと契約している黒人選手は一人もいなくなった。1937年、マーシャルはレッドスキンズを、依然として人種隔離が行われていた南部の都市ワシントンDCに移転させ、チーム名をワシントン・レッドスキンズに変更した。黒人選手をNFLから排除するマーシャルのいわゆる「紳士協定」は、第二次世界大戦後、人種隔離のない競合リーグとしてオールアメリカン・フットボール・カンファレンス（AAFC）が1946年に発足するまで続いた。 NFLのオーナーたちは折れて禁止令を解除したが、マーシャルは1962年までレッドスキンズに黒人選手を一人も契約することを拒否し、最終的にジョン・F・ケネディ大統領から、レッドスキンズが人種統合しない限り30年間のスタジアムリース契約を解除するという脅迫を受けて折れた。^{[ 1 ]}

1949年、ジョージ・タリアフェロはNFLにドラフトされた最初の黒人選手となった。タリアフェロは以前、インディアナ・フージャーズでカレッジフットボールをプレーしていた。1946年シーズンはアメリカ陸軍に徴兵されたため欠場したが、1948年に復帰し、フージャーズのランとパスの両方でチームを牽引した。1949年、NFLのシカゴ・ベアーズがタリアフェロをドラフトしたが、彼はすでにAAFCのロサンゼルス・ドンズと契約を結んでいた。LAドンズは後に解散し、タリアフェロを含む数名の選手がNFLに加入した。彼はNFL史上最多となる、シングルウィング・テールバックやクォーターバックを含む、前例のない7つのポジションをキャリアの中でプレーした。タリアフェロは1955年に引退した。^{[ 1 ] [ 18 ] [ 23 ]}

Two other Black quarterbacks made brief appearances in the pre-Super Bowl NFL. Willie Thrower, "the first Black NFL quarterback of the modern mold", played for Michigan State in college before playing one professional game at quarterback for the Bears, in relief duty, on October 18, 1953. Charlie Brackins, the NFL's first Black quarterback to have graduated from a historically Black college or university (HBCU), played one game as quarterback for the Green Bay Packers in 1955, missed both of his pass attempts, and was released by the team before the next game.^[1]

Of the dozens of quarterbacks on the rosters of the 26 major league professional teams in the United States, Marlin is the only one whose skin is black ... But Marlin is not mainly interested in proving he can run the ball. What he's trying to show them is that a black man can run the ball club.

In 1967, the American Football League agreed to merge with the NFL, becoming the American Football Conference, with most former NFL teams forming the National Football Conference. Although the first championship game between the two conferences, known as the Super Bowl, was held in 1967, the merger was not completed until 1970. Marlin Briscoe played for the Denver Broncos, an AFL team, in 1968, and is considered the first Black quarterback to start a game in the modern NFL. Briscoe started his rookie year as a defensive back, but when the starting quarterback was injured, Briscoe was called to fill in. He started the last five games of the season, during which he threw 14 touchdown passes and was a candidate for Rookie of the Year. Nevertheless, he was released after the season, and later converted to a receiver.^[1][15][22]

黒人クォーターバック4人がNFLのMVP賞を合計6回受賞している。パトリック・マホームズが複数回受賞した最初の選手で、ラマー・ジャクソンが2人目だ。

1974年、ジェームズ・ハリスはNFLプレーオフで先発出場し勝利した初の黒人クォーターバックとなった。^{[ 4 ] [ 8 ]} 1976年シーズンの途中で、ハリスはチームオーナーのキャロル・ローゼンブルームによってベンチに下げられた。ローゼンブルームは報道陣に対し、「残念ながら、クォーターバックというポジションは、人種という要素を加えることなくとも十分に物議を醸すものだ」と説明し、その決定を説明した。^{[ 2 ]}引退後、ハリスは4つのチームで幹部を務め、2000年にはボルチモア・レイブンズでスーパーボウルリングを獲得した。^{[ 2 ]}

7回のプレーオフ出場を果たしたウォーレン・ムーンは、プロフットボール殿堂入りを果たした初の黒人クォーターバックである。^{[ 3 ]}彼はNFLでのキャリア（1984年～2000年）において、4つの異なるチームでプレーした初の黒人クォーターバックだった。^{[ 1 ] [ 22 ]}

2023年から2024年のプレーオフでは、NFL史上最多となる6人の黒人クォーターバックが先発出場した。^{[ 25 ] [ f ]}

2024年から2025年のプレーオフでは、黒人の先発クォーターバックが7人出場し、これはNFL史上最多であり、カンファレンスチャンピオンシップラウンドの先発クォーターバック4人のうち3人が黒人だった。

In 1982, a players' strike cut the NFL season short to nine games. When a second strike occurred in 1987, the NFL, not wanting to lose games, hired replacement players. That year, Black quarterbacks in the league tripled in number.^[1]

On September 20, 1987, Doug Williams became the first Black quarterback to start a game for the Washington Redskins, the team that had been segregated for so long by its former owner, George Preston Marshall.^[27][28] Before starting for Washington, Williams had been drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and led them to three playoff appearances in three years.^[1] Williams joined the Redskins in the 1986 season, when he threw only one pass (incomplete). He played backup for most of the 1987 season, but outperformed the first-string quarterback, and was made starting quarterback for the playoffs.^[1] On January 31, 1988, he became the first Black quarterback to start in the Super Bowl, and a few hours later, the first to win it, ironically wearing the Super Bowl ring of the last team in the league to integrate Black players.^[29] Williams threw for 340 yards and four touchdowns–Super Bowl records at the time–and was named Super Bowl MVP.^[4][30] He was benched the next season and retired shortly thereafter.^[1]

Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes was the seventh Black quarterback to start a Super Bowl.^[31] The combined Super Bowl records of Black quarterbacks is 5–7. Williams, Mahomes and Hurts are to date the only players to win the Super Bowl MVP award.^[32] Only Mahomes and Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson, Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts have started multiple Super Bowls. In 2023, Mahomes became the first to start three Super Bowls.^[31] With the Chiefs' win, Mahomes became the first Black quarterback to win two Super Bowls, as well as to win two MVP awards. The following year, he became the first Black quarterback to repeat as Super Bowl champion.

スーパーボウル LVIIでは、スーパーボウルの先発クォーターバックが両方とも黒人だったのも初めてだった。カンザスシティ チーフスのパトリック マホームズとフィラデルフィア イーグルスのジェイレン ハーツが先発した。^{[ 31 ] [ 33 ]}イーグルスは、スーパーボウルで 2 人の異なる黒人先発クォーターバックを起用した最初のチームである。

ギャラリー

2000年、ダグ・ウィリアムズ、ウォーレン・ムーン、マーリン・ブリスコー、ジェームズ・ハリスは、黒人クォーターバックのための友愛団体であるフィールド・ジェネラルズを結成した。^{[ 8 ]}