CANTON, Ohio -- It looked odd. Backward might be the better word. He came before them, yet he followed them into immortality. Fifty members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame sat behind two of Frederick Douglass "Fritz" Pollard's grandsons representing him at his enshrinement. And yet they all stood on his shoulders.
"He helped build this league," said one of the grandsons, Dr. Stephen Towns.
Pollard was a 5-foot-9, 165-pound back in the 1920s, long before the National Football League was a year-round obsession, commanded billions from networks to televise its games and could draw 21,766 to its Hall of Fame ceremony. Back then there was no television. And there would be no NFL if not for the likes of Pollard, who was one of the best and most popular players in the upstart league, known then as the American Professional Football League, then the American Professional Football Association, and finally the NFL.
Pollard and Jim Thorpe were the game's biggest attractions, Pollard possessing the "speed of Tony Dorsett, the elusiveness of Barry Sanders, and the tenacity of Walter Payton," Towns said. Pollard played for the Akron Pros/Indians, Milwaukee Badgers, Hammond (Ind.) Pros, and Providence Steam Roller of the NFL. The Akron Pros were the league's first champions, going 8-0-3 in 1920. The following year Pollard became the first African-American head coach in the NFL and the only one until the Raiders hired Art Shell in 1989. In 1923, Pollard played quarterback for Hammond, making him the league's first black quarterback.
His moment finally arrived Sunday.
"We've always been on a strange range of emotions, I guess, about him being out so long," said Towns, who accepted Pollard's posthumous induction.
Fritz Pollard III took a pass, having spent the past 15 years speaking on his grandfather's behalf.
"The day it was announced [Feb. 5 in Jacksonville, Fla.], I went into the press conference and my knees almost buckled," he said.
Thankfully, Pollard never faltered nor wavered under difficult circumstances. In thanks, the Fritz Pollard Alliance -- the organization that promotes minority hiring in the NFL -- took out a full-page ad in this year's game program featuring a shot of Pollard surrounded by photos of the eight modern-era black coaches (six current). The ad reads, "You paved the path we trod. We are forever grateful."
It took a while for the NFL and the writers who decide Hall membership to express their gratitude by bestowing the sport's highest honor upon Pollard. Ask the Pollard family, and they'll tell you their late patriarch, who passed away in 1986 at the age of 92, should have gone in in 1963 with the inaugural class that included peers "Red" Grange, George Halas, "Curly" Lambeau and Thorpe, not 32 years later with forward pass pioneer Benny Friedman, Dan Marino and Steve Young. Pollard has been a member of the College Football Hall of Fame since 1954.
"Thorpe became the first commissioner of pro football, was inducted into the first [class] of the football Hall of Fame," Towns said in the most poignant remarks of his speech. "My grandfather became a footnote until today."
Pollard's induction was long overdue and 19 years too late, as it turned out. Still, it happened at a most appropriate time.
Think about it. Pro football is the most popular sport in the United States. Many of the faces of the game are black ones. When Pollard started, he was one of two African-American players in the league. This was almost 30 years before Jackie Robinson integrated baseball, so it isn't hard to imagine what life was like for Pollard. To protect against opposing players piling on after a play in protest of his presence, Pollard perfected the technique of rolling over and lifting his spikes. Modern players get hit with a few boos on the road. Pollard had to keep an eye out for flying rocks and sometimes needed to be escorted onto the field. He dressed for games in a cigar store. And then, of course, there were the standard acts of discrimination at hotels and restaurants.
"A lot of players take a lot of this stuff for granted," Towns said. "My grandfather was the highest-paid player in the league, yet before games he would have to get dressed in his car.
"Many times he was the only black player on either team, and probably the only person of color in the stadium," he said.
Pollard fought segregation and formed independent teams when the NFL banned black players from the early 1930s to the mid-'40s. Today 69 percent of NFL players are black and just over 70 percent minority, according to a 2004 report by the University of Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport. Black, white or whatever -- they dress like CEOs now and arrive at work in automobiles whose cost equals a year's income for most families. Pro football is such a lucrative industry that Terrell Owens can have the gall to ask the Philadelphia Eagles to renegotiate a year into a $49 million contract. Indeed, the face of the NFL's offseason wore a frown, as Owens appeared on SportsCenter this summer about as often as Stuart Scott. Michael Vick jerseys are everywhere. Ray Lewis, Donovan McNabb, Randy Moss, Michael Strahan -- they're among the brightest stars of the sport.
For 68 years after Pollard, there were no black head coaches. Today there are six, as well as 11 coordinators and upward of 170 minority assistants. Romeo Crennel is attempting to rebuild the Browns just up Interstate 77 in Cleveland. Another African-American, Marvin Lewis, leads intrastate rival Cincinnati. Lovie Smith is the man in charge at hallowed Halas Hall, home of the Chicago Bears. The Colts' Tony Dungy has a good chance to become the first black coach to guide a team to the Super Bowl. Herman Edwards' Jets are the best team in New York and one of the elite teams in the AFC. Lewis' Bengals and Dennis Green's Cardinals could be two of this year's surprise teams.
There is also growing black representation in front offices, led by Baltimore general manger Ozzie Newsome and Arizona GM Rod Graves. The second Fritz Pollard Alliance breakfast this spring at the scouting combine in Indianapolis was a sight to see, a room jammed with influential African-Americans.
"For there to be a legacy, you need a cornerstone," Edwards said last week from Jets camp. "You need that first brick. And that first brick has to be strong. [Pollard] didn't live his life to make a living. He lived to make a difference."
What might he have to say about how far both the game -- and African-Americans' place in it -- have come?
"It would literally knock his socks off," Towns said. "He's sitting around here somewhere smiling, just thrilled to death about the progress the league has made. The next thing, knowing him, would be, 'Hey, when are we going to get an owner?' "
Justice having been served, we can appreciate how poetic this was. There really has not been a more ideal time during which to educate the football masses on the contributions of Fritz Pollard, what with the overwhelming presence of African-Americans on the field and in management. Supposedly, good things come to those who wait. Fritz Pollard and his family were made to wait far too long to receive the recognition he deserves. Pollard earned the right to be present with his bust.
In terms of diversity, there has been no period in the history of pro football like the present. That is Fritz Pollard's legacy.
Michael Smith is a senior writer for ESPN.com.