What’s the point of focusing on color?

Your five-column headline on the front page of Friday’s sports section (“Dawgs-Bruins: Historic moment in Pac-10”) caught my eye as it was intended to do. Now that your writer Mike Allende has informed me that the coaches from UW and UCLA are both black, I must ask the question “So what?” Why do we care? Historical moments are usually preserved in history books; is this something our children should be taught so they can pass their social studies WASL someday?

I was under the impression that Ty Willingham was hired because he was a good coach with the potential to turn around a dismal UW football program, not because of his skin color. When was the last time two Catholic coaches faced each other in the Pac-10? How about the Irish coaches? Are there any Hispanic coaches in the Pac-10? Why haven’t you written about them and why would we care?

Does coaching against another black coach give Willingham an advantage? A disadvantage? I’m sure that he could care less about the color of the opposing coach’s skin and most of your readers probably feel the same way. Let’s let the tabloids write about race while The Herald writers go back to comparing players and coaching skills.

Bill Morgan

Everett