What would Bill Willis say?

Indeed, what would the man who, along with his teammate and fellow Pro Football Hall of Famer Marion Motley, permanently broke the color barrier in not just football but pro sports overall when they played in the first-ever Browns game in 1946, say about the fact that there will be two Black quarterbacks starting for the first time in the Super Bowl when Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs square off against Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday night?

I think he would lean back, roll his eyes and laugh heartily. He did that a lot when, while working for the Browns, I interviewed him on camera in a Downtown Cleveland hotel. He told me all kind of horrible things that happened to him and also Mötley when they were playing for the Browns, especially in those first three or four years when the hate for their presence in a white man’s sport was most obvious. He wasn’t overly bitter about it, but you could tell that it did bother him — a lot. He was a man of class and a real gentleman, so he didn’t spew hatred back when he talked.

Willis knew, though, that what he did was important, and that he had to endure it. For if he did not, there would not be moments like this now with Mahomes and Hurts dueling against each other on the sport’s biggest stage.

Somewhere, I know he’s watching. Somewhere, he’s taking all of this in, and I know he is incredibly happy. In fact, he and Motley, who were very, very close, are probably looking at it together. They must be absolutely amazed, and they have to be filled with unbridled joy. What they fought so hard to get, is now starting to come true more and more and more, but there’s still a long, long, way to go.

Steve King

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