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After Matt Rhule’s firing, Steve Wilks steps into unwinnable battle too many Black coaches have fought

Steve Wilks is the latest Black coach whose shot at a head coaching job is on an interim basis amid a mess left behind by someone else. (Bob Donnan-USA TODAY Sports)

By Shalise Manza Young Yahoo Sports 

Not long after the Carolina Panthers announced they had fired head coach Matt Rhule partway through the third year of his failed but highly lucrative tenure (he earned roughly $5.6 million for each of his 11 wins in 38 tries), the team announced that Wilks, the secondary coach and defensive pass game coordinator, would take over as interim head coach.

Wilks is now the 15th Black man to be an interim head coach in the NFL since 1990, or about 30 percent of the interim stints in the league over that time. Black coaches have gotten a chance to be a full-time head coach just 13 percent of the time over the same period, in a league where roughly two-third of players are Black.

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