oth offense and defense Russell Okung Color Rush Jersey , but they did pretty well on special teams.Kicker Jason Myers was reliable throughout the season and found a spot on the AFC Pro Bowl roster. He’s joined on that roster by kick returner Andre Roberts, who is also PFT’s choice for the top special teams player of the year.Roberts signed with the Jets as a free agent in the offseason and scored on a punt return to help the team to a win on the first Monday night of the season. Roberts also had a 99-yard kickoff return for a touchdown in Week 16 and was one of only two players to score touchdowns on both plays this season.Jakeem Grant of the Dolphins was the other player to do that, but injury kept him from playing the entire season. Roberts had several other big returns over the course of the season to help a sputtering offense get points off of short fields. He led the league with an average of 14.1 yards per punt return and finished second with 29.4 yards per kickoff return, although it should be noted that he handled nearly twice as many kickoffs as Darius Jennings.Rams linebacker Cory Littleton, Texans kicker Ka'imi Fairbairn and Giants kicker Aldrick Rosas were some of the other notable special teams performers this season.PFT is also recognizing Chargers kicker Michael Badgley as the league’s top special teams rookie for 2018. Badgley failed to make the Colts out of camp and landed with the Chargers in October when Caleb Sturgis was injured. He made all three field goals he tried, but was briefly off the active roster when Sturgis was deemed healthy enough to return.Good health didn’t help Sturgis to good results, however Junior Seau Color Rush Jersey , and Badley was back in the job in early November. He finished the year 15-of-16 on field goals and 25-of-26 extra points to solidify a position that’s been a trouble spot for the Chargers whether they were in San Diego and Los Angeles in recent years.Seahawks punter Michael Dickson gets a strong honorable mention on the rookie front. He had a net average of 42.5 yards per punt to help Seattle win many field position battles on their way to the postseason. While the NFL office continues to receive high grades for its racial hiring practices, a diversity report shows there are still major strides needed at the team level.The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport released its annual racial and gender report card Wednesday, giving the NFL as a whole an A- for its racial hiring — the ninth straight year it has received a grade or A- or better. The league received a C for gender hiring, giving it an overall grade of a B in racial and gender hiring practices.While the study’s author Richard Lapchick said the league’s grade for racial hiring was “impressive,” he cautioned that the league’s 32 teams simply need to do a better job of hiring people of color.“It shows that across the league, particularly from the commissioner’s office, that there’s an attempt to have a strong base for diversity Desmond King Color Rush Jersey ,” Lapchick said. “But the league is way ahead of the teams, particularly in (hiring at) senior level positions for women and people of color.”The study found that of the 32 general managers, only four — or 12.5 percent — are people of color. Lapchick said that doesn’t adequately reflect a league whose players are made up predominantly (72.6 percent) of people of color.The TIDES report was based on the 2018 season, so it was completed before five coaches of color were fired in the days after the season. That leaves only three coaches of color in the NFL currently — Los Angeles Chargers‘ Anthony Lynn, Pittsburgh’s Mike Tomlin and Carolina’s Ron Rivera — although the Miami Dolphins are expected to hire Patriots assistant coach Brian Flores, who is black, after New England is finished playing in the Super Bowl.In 2017 Corey Liuget Color Rush Jersey , the NFL matched its all-time high of eight head coaches of color first reached in 2011 with the addition of Vance Joseph in Denver and Lynn.The NFL has worked this past year to strengthen the Rooney Rule, a mandate that coaches of color must be interviewed for any vacant head coaching position. The new rules state that teams are now required to go outside of their own organizations to interview a candidate of color or interview a candidate who is on the league’s career development advisory panel.Lapchick said based on the history of the NFL racial and gender hiring report, the coaching changes are a cyclical thing and he’s confident it will swing back up with more coaches of color being hired in the future.Still, he said, four coaches of color are far too few.TIDES announced Wednesday it was not releasing the number of people of color in NFL coordinator positions because of a discrepancy they found in the report.The coordinator position was a point of concern two years ago when Lapchick said he was bothered by the lack of progress at that position, considering most head coaches first serve as coordinators. The percentage of assistant coaches of color dipped slightly from 31.9 percent a year ago to 31.4 percent in 2017.In terms of gender hiring, Lapchick said generally speaking none of the professional teams aren’t doing well with the exception of the NBA Dan Feeney Color Rush Jersey , where anticipates it won’t be long before there is a female coach.“That is something we have to pay more attention to,” Lapchick said of the low gender hiring numbers.The issue, of course, is the NFL is a league made up of — and played — historically by men, which leaves women at a distinct disadvantage of getting hired.But Lapchick still sees a niche in NFL teams where women can flourish on the business side.“A woman can be trained equally as well as a man can,” Lapchick said.