Racism. It was assumed that they didn’t have the mental capacity to handle the complexity of running an NFL offense. Clearly, that isn’t true. But, McNabb is by no means the first black quarterback in the NFL. Indeed there have been a number of black quarterbacks including Doug Williams, Warren Moon, Steve McNair, Randall Cunningham, Michael Vick and Donovan McNabb. There are more currently, including Vince Young and DaMarcus Russell. The landscape is changing. I’m not an expert on this, I’m sure I’m missing some.