Satisfaction Guaranteed

Donovan McNabb and Michael Vick are dueling to become Charles P. Conrad Jr.

Who? Exactly. History doesn’t pay enough attention to No. 3. You’ve heard of Neil Armstrong and probably Buzz Aldrin, but you probably didn’t know that Pete Conrad was the third man to step on the moon.

The winner of Sunday’s game between McNabb’s Philadelphia Eagles and Vick’s Atlanta Falcons will advance to the Super Bowl, the elusive lunar surface of the NFL, and in the process make one of these two men only the third black quarterback to start in the big game.

Sunday’s matchup is historic in its own right. For the first time, two black quarterbacks will start a conference championship game.

To say this doesn’t count as a significant milestone anymore, that it was a statistical inevitability in an age when black quarterbacks are picked at the top of the draft and pop up throughout the NFL, is to ignore the long road that brought them here, to brush aside the battles that black quarterbacks still face.

The moment isn’t lost on Warren Moon. He was good enough to last 17 years in the league and finish among the top five in completions, yards passing and touchdown passes. But when he came out of the University of Washington in 1978, the NFL had no place for a black quarterback, so he had to spend the first six seasons of his career in the Canadian Football League.

“It seems like a long time ago,” Moon said. “But a lot has happened in between that time. Doug Williams’ getting to the Super Bowl -- not only getting there, but dominating and winning the MVP [for the Washington Redskins in 1988].

“Then Steve McNair [with Tennessee in 2000]. There has been a lot of progress as far as quieting the stereotypes that we can’t lead a team to the championship.”

The participants in Sunday’s NFC championship game didn’t downplay the importance of this meeting, with McNabb, 28, noting that “things have changed,” and Vick, 24, adding: “It shows how far we have come and how far this league has come. Regardless of what happens, an African American quarterback will be playing in the Super Bowl, and that’s a big honor. So this game does mean a lot to me. That’s a big step for all of us.”

Moon gets some credit here. Even if he never made it past the conference championship game himself, he persevered and then prospered in the NFL’s not-so-long-ago Dark Ages, setting the stage for the likes of McNabb, Vick, Aaron Brooks, Daunte Culpepper and Byron Leftwich

“The progression has been great,” Moon said. “It won’t be long until you see two blacks in the Super Bowl playing against each other.

“We still have a way to go, as far as coaching and front office positions. But there’s definitely been a lot of progress, as far as the quarterback position, not only because we have a bunch of guys starting, but there’s a lot of guys who are backups or the next guy in. It used to be, if you played a black quarterback, he had to be a star in order for him to play. Now, it doesn’t matter if he’s a star. He can be a backup. A black quarterback just belongs now.”

Moon is just as happy that the third-string quarterback behind McNabb is Jeff Blake, and the backup to New England quarterback Tom Brady is Rohan Davey. Both reserve QBs are African American.

“That’s where I always felt the most discrimination was,” Moon said. “Who wouldn’t want a black quarterback if he could be a star for you? What about the other guys? Are you going to give them the patience you give white quarterbacks?”

The NFL doesn’t do radical change. It embraces conformity and sneers at innovation. It shouldn’t take a physics major to determine that if Michael Vick is faster than a Formula One car, maybe he should run with the ball.

The establishment said that quarterbacks couldn’t run, shouldn’t run, and that no team could win that way. Well, Vick ran 120 times this season for 902 yards. He ranked 23rd in the league in yards rushing, the only quarterback among the top 30. And his team is one victory away from the Super Bowl.

But that anti-run sentiment is so pervasive that it keeps McNabb from taking off as often as he could. He ran one-third as often as Vick this season.

McNabb still can do it when he has to, though. In the game during which Terrell Owens was injured, McNabb helped beat Dallas by running for two first downs in a late drive. And if the Eagles are going to end their three-game NFC title-game losing streak, he’ll have to be on the move again. He can’t stand still against a fearsome Atlanta pass rush that led the NFL in sacks.

Even though the Eagles are more dangerous when McNabb is a threat to run, he doesn’t want to feed into the stereotype of the black running quarterback.

“I think Donovan knows that if he runs a whole lot, people are going to try to stick that tag on him,” Moon said. “I also tell him he has to play his game. Part of what makes him who he is is being able to move around.

“Steve Young ran, but he wasn’t considered a running quarterback. He won passing-rating titles. You have to use what you have.

“In my younger days, I was looked upon as a scrambler. That’s what they try to generalize all black quarterbacks as.

“Michael Vick is known as the best running quarterback there is. They never talk about his passing ability. He’s still Michael Vick; he’s got to be who he is. It got him in the championship game.

“I don’t think it really matters what you do, as long as you’re effective at it, as long you make good decisions and don’t hurt your football team. The way they play the game, you can do a lot of things at the quarterback spot and still be effective. There’s no certain type of quarterback.”

And, slowly but surely, there’s no certain color either. If you need a sign of how much distance is yet to be traveled, keep this in mind: Even with this one small step, when Super Bowl XXXIX rolls around in a couple of weeks, there still will be more Xs in the name of the game than black quarterbacks who have started in it.

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J.A. Adande can be reached at j.a.adande@latimes.com To read previous columns by Adande, go to latimes.com/adande.

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Reaching Final Four

Since Doug Williams led the Washington Redskins to victory in Super Bowl XXII, six black starting quarterbacks have reached NFL conference title games. How they fared:

*--* DONOVAN McNABB, Philadelphia * Lost in 2004 NFC champ. vs. Carolina * Lost in 2003 NFC champ. vs. Tampa Bay * Lost in 2002 NFC champ. vs. St. Louis DAUNTE CULPEPPER, Minnesota * Lost in 2001 NFC champ. vs. N.Y. Giants STEVE McNAIR, Tennessee * Lost in 2003 AFC champ. vs. Oakland * Won in 2000 AFC champ. vs. Jacksonville SHAUN KING, Tampa Bay * Lost in 2000 NFC champ. vs. St. Louis RANDALL CUNNINGHAM, Minnesota * Lost in 1999 NFC champ. vs. Atlanta KORDELL STEWART, Pittsburgh * Lost in 2002 AFC champ. vs. New England * Lost in 1998 AFC champ. vs. Denver

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Watch Those Guys!

Atlanta’s Michael Vick and Philadelphia’s Donovan McNabb rank first and third, respectively, in career playoff rushing yards per attempt for quarterbacks.

*--* QUARTERBACK TEAM ATTEMPTS YARDS AVERAGE MICHAEL VICK Atlanta 24 213 8.9 STEVE McNAIR Tennessee 54 349 6.5 DONOVAN McNABB Philadelphia 52 330 6.4 STEVE YOUNG San Francisco 96 585 6.1 JOE KAPP Minnesota/Boston 27 160 5.9

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