Is there a trend in football now, the 3 final Heisman candidates...

[brush]

were all black, mobile quarterbacks? Cunningham and Vick were the forerunners followed by Kaepernick, RG3 and Wilson and now Watson and Mahomes are the new young guns.

My question is, do they represent the prototype for future NFL quarterbacks or will the football landscape follow the pattern of what happened in baseball where black stars, once the game opened up with Jackie Robinson in the late 40s, flourished in the 50s, 60s, 70s and on into the 80s but were overtaken by the growing influx of Latinx players (although there haven't been many Latinx qbs)?

[HopeAgain]

1. I hope it's not about race at all.

[brush]

2. It is what it is, and the reality right now seems to be towards mobile, strong-armed...

QBs who now just happend to be AAs.

[JayhawkSD]

3. For how many years was it running backs?

One running back after another. No other position considered.

Then football rules changed and now the running game is obsolete. Runners with a 100-yard game are rare. Melvin Gordon went 80 yards in one game and news writers went crazy with superlatives.

The defensive backfield no longer can play defense. Hitting a receiver is called "targeting." Touching a receiver is called "pass interference, holding, or illegal contact." Pass defense today means accompanying the receiver downfield and hoping he falls down when he catches the ball.

[getting old in mke]

9. Melvin Gordon

Averaged 155 rushing yards per game his last two years, so the superlatives were probably for the defense

Your point overall, though, about the change from RBs to QBs in the Heisman is spot on, though. With the advent of the playoffs, though, I think the teams with excellent QBs are getting more visibility.

[rampartc]

4. this has been the trend for a while

but there is always room for a drew brees, brady, or andrew luck.

the mobile quarterbacks tend towards injury and try to stay in the pocket for self defense. even cam newton has cut back on the running.

the heir apparent to drew brees seems to be taysom hill: fast mobile and white.

[brush]

5. There's also Roethlisberger of the Steelers who is big, hard to bring down...

and is nimble enough in the pocket to extend plays.

Race has little to do with it, when it comes down to it, it's really body type and it just so happens the the current crop happens to be AA.

In my original post I mentioned how Latinx ballplayers have made a huge impact on baseball, but where are the Latinx football players?

Btw, McCaffrey of Carolina is a superb running back and is white. I go back a ways and also remember Taylor, Csonka, Kiick, Riggins, Bleier and even Jon Arnett of the Rams during the Deacon Jones era.

[rampartc]

6. there are certainly latinxs who are big enough to play football

but the small qiuck stereotype makes a better shortstop.

and absolutely, rhere are plenty of candidates in all races for positions in sports, but perhaps some desperate need to escape the inner city drives blacks, while that desire may be lacking in a siburbanite with some alternatives.

[brush]

8. True enough.

[JonLP24]

7. There is statistical discrimination in sports

That is a reason why there are more white QBs there is more of this in baseball. It is why black athletes were largely outfielders or relief pitchers.

There is less of that as far as the QB situation goes but I would ask Colin Kaepernick or all the play as a receiver pre draft talk for Lamar Jackson.
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Statistical discrimination is an economic theory of racial or gender inequality which results when economic agents (consumers, workers, employers, etc.) have imperfect information about individuals they interact with. According to this theory, inequality may exist and persist between demographic groups even when economic agents are rational and non-prejudiced.

The theory was pioneered by Kenneth Arrow and Edmund Phelps [1] This type of discrimination can result in a self-reinforcing vicious circle over time, as the atypical individuals from the discriminated group are discouraged from participating in the market,[2] or improving their skills as their (average) return on investment (education etc.) is less than for the non-discriminated group.[3]

A related form of (theorized) statistical discrimination is based on group variances, assuming equal averages. For discrimination to occur in this scenario, the decision maker needs to be risk averse; such a decision maker will prefer the group with the lower variance.[4] Even assuming two theoretically identical group distributions (in all respects, including average and variance), a risk averse decision maker will prefer the group for which a measurement (test) exists that minimizes the error term.[4] For example, if two groups, A and B, have theoretically identical distributions of test scores well above the average for the entire population, but group A's estimate is considered more reliable because a large amount of data may be available for group A in comparison to group B, then if two people, one from A and one from B apply for a job, using statistical discrimination, A is hired, because it is perceived that his group score is a more reliable estimate, so a risk-averse decision maker sees group B's group score as more likely to be luck. Conversely, if the two groups are below average, B is hired, because group A's negative score is believed to be a better estimate.

It has been suggested that home mortgage lending discrimination against African Americans, which is illegal in the United States, may be partly caused by statistical discrimination.[5]

Market forces are expected to penalize some forms of statistical discrimination; for example, a company capable and willing to test its job applicants on relevant metrics is expected to do better than one that relies only on group averages for employment decisions.[6][

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_discrimination_(economics)