The NFL is requiring each and every NFL team to hire a minority offensive assistant coach for the 2022 season. The coach can be “a female or a member of an ethnic or racial minority.”
The move aims to address the league’s diversity efforts and increase the number of minorities in the offensive coaching talent pool. The coach will be paid from a league-wide fund.
“It’s a recognition that at the moment, when you look at stepping stones for a head coach, they are the coordinator positions,” said Steelers owner Art Rooney II, the chairman of the NFL Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee. “We clearly have a trend where coaches are coming from the offensive side of the ball in recent years, and we clearly do not have as many minorities in the offensive coordinator [job].”
If a team already has such a coach in place on the staff, he or she will count toward the requirement. In addition to the assistant coaching mandate, the NFL also added women to the language of the Rooney Rule—designed to increase the number of minority candidates in coaching interviews—at all levels.
“The truth of the matter is that as of today, at least, there aren’t many women in the pool in terms of head coach,” Rooney said. “We hope that is going to change over the years, but for that reason we didn’t see it as inhibiting the number of interviews for racial minorities at this point in time. Obviously, we can address that as time goes on, but for now we didn’t see that as an issue.
“Really, we are looking at probably the early stages of women entering the coaching ranks, so we may be a little ways away before that becomes a problem.”
Minority coaches now make up 39% of the league total, and there’s a league-record 12 women on coaching staffs.
The league also issued a mission statement to encourage and attract diverse members of prospective ownership groups: “The membership will regard it as a positive and meaningful factor if the group includes diverse individuals who would have a significant equity stake in and involvement with the club, including serving as the controlling owner of the club.”
The league also established a Diversity Advisory Committee.
