"the NFL" that created these rules, is the NFL ownership and executives.  The Rooney rule came into being because a majority of the NFL owners said "yeah, we got a problem with under-representation of minorities at the top levels" and tried to come up with a strategy to address it.  Whether or not it's an effective strategy is a different issue.  The point is it wasn't some nebulous group called "the NFL" deciding there was a problem, it was the NFL owners themselves concluding this based upon d