Roger Goodell announces Rooney Rule for women
Women are getting a better shot at being in the NFL.
The National Football League is trying to take some steps to be more inclusive at the highest positions of its fiefdom, for both minorities and women.
On Thursday, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced that there will be a Rooney Rule imposed for women who are seeking front office positions. In essence, the league will be required to interview at least one woman for any executive front office job, just as teams are required to at least interview one minority for head coaching vacancies.
Roger Goodell just announced the NFL will institute a Rooney rule for women regarding executive league office positions.
— Richard Deitsch (@richarddeitsch) February 4, 2016
The NFL has been making some progress on these fronts. Currently, the NFL has a litany of successful black head coaches including Mike Tomlin, Jim Caldwell and Marvin Lewis. There have also been some inroads made for women, with the Buffalo Bills recently hiring the first full-time female assistant coach in league history. The Arizona Cardinals broke down that barrier to an extent this preseason, bringing on Jen Walter in an intern program.
The rest of the sports world has been fairly slow to include minorities and women in their ranks. The NBA has Becky Hammon as an assistant with the San Antonio Spurs, but the National Hockey League and Major League Baseball have nothing of the sort.