|
It can be a close relationship at times, but it can’t be too close.
An interest can be shown in the players’ lives, yet a willingness to coldly send
them packing is essential.
The slightest misstep on either side of the tightrope can lead to a big fall.
A coach must have his players’ respect, but he can’t get caught up in a
desire to be liked.
"The best coordinator I’ve ever been around just didn’t have it as a
head coach," Giants vice president-GM Ernie Accorsi said. "I never would have
hired him, and he failed. As brilliant as he was, it mattered too much if the players
liked him. He didn’t want to be disliked by players. That was just going to be fatal
to him."
Bears defensive coordinator Greg Blache concurred with Accorsi’s analysis.
"Trust me, there are tons of guys in our business like that," Blache said.
"Not just head coaches, there are position coaches who aren’t successful because
they want everybody to like them. You have parents who are unsuccessful parents. Their
kids are on all kinds of drugs and all kinds of things because they always want (the kids)
to like them, and they don’t take the time to give (the kids) what they need. They
give them what they want. And what (the kids) want is not usually what they need. Quite
honestly, I can see that. I’ve seen that. I’ve worked with guys that wanted
everybody to like them. You can’t work in our business, you can’t get things
done, you can’t be successful worrying about keeping everybody happy, because
you’re not going to do it. You have to find out what’s right, you have to do
what’s right and then from that point, you just keep working."
If a coach wants a good friend he needs to look to an old college buddy, not one of his
players. In the book "Winning is a Habit: Vince Lombardi on Winning, Success and the
Pursuit of Excellence," the legendary former coach said, "I hold it more
important to have the players’ confidence than their affection."
This is not to say that a coach must be a cold, distant jerk to his players. Somewhere
in between is the place to be. Right smack on the tightrope.
NFL Coaches Association executive director Larry Kennan, who previously coached 15
years in the NFL, said, "I told (players) this, ‘I’m going to be your
friend, but I’m not going to be your buddy. I’m not going to go drink beer with
you and chase around with you, but I’m going to be your friend, and I’m going to
help you in any way I can and like you and respect you like a friend would. But I’m
not going to invite you to my house all the time or go out and drink beer with you.’
"
There is an invisible line that players and coaches must find, and they must recognize
that they can go up to it but not step over it.
"I can go so far with a player, and they can go so far with me, and that’s
it," Lions assistant coach Don Clemons said. "I don’t know how you describe
that, but there definitely has to be a separation. You can’t be hanging around with
the guys, and they can’t be hanging around with you, because you have your job to do,
and they have theirs. And we all depend on each other. And if you cross that line,
it’s too hard, especially if it’s your player, the guy that you have to
coach."
Patriots LB Larry Izzo said, in describing his relationship with head coach Bill
Belichick, "I have a lot of respect for him. He is a very intellectual coach. You
don’t want your head coach to be your buddy. You don’t need your head coach to
go out and have a couple of beers with you. You want a guy who’s your boss. You
don’t need to be friends with your boss."
Just when you think you have a handle on where the line belongs between coach and
player, it moves. While mutual respect and a professional rapport are the norm, every now
and then the relationship does need to get a little more personal.
Sometimes a coach must allow real life to spill over into football life. A
single-minded, robotic approach to the game will not always work.
Asked about Giants head coach Jim Fassel, DE Michael Strahan said, "He’s a
guy that you can have anything that you need to talk to him about and you’ll feel
comfortable. And we have personal situations where a guy needs to miss a preseason game
because he wants to go to a wedding, and he lets him do it. One guy missed a walk-through
on Saturday because he wanted to watch his son play his first football game, and he let
him do it. Things like that, you do things like that for players and those players will go
out of their way to do anything for you. And we all respect him and have a very open
relationship with him. Everybody is comfortable."
Although the player-coach relationship may not be one of life-long buddies discussing
the meaning of life, it must be more than coldly professional so that things can get
worked out satisfactorily.
Said Falcons RB coach Ollie Wilson: "Obviously I’m not into their home life,
and I don’t get involved in their marriage status and all the things that they do
that way, but I want them to feel as though if they’ve got something they need to
talk about or something we’ve got to get talked out, that they can walk in the door
and say, ‘Hey, I need to talk to you about this,’ and feel good about that.
"We spend a lot of time with these guys. It’s for seven months we see them
seven days a week for maybe five or six hours a day, and it’s a lot of time, so
there’s got to be a working relationship. It’s kind of like working with the
marriage. It’s something where it’s not something you can say it’s just
automatic. You’ve got to work at it."
When a coach spends that much time with a player, even if protocol says they can’t
become best friends, common sense says they need to be more than emotionless robots toward
one another.
Said Chiefs TE coach Keith Rowen: "I think it’s important that you care about
them. That there’s an involvement."
Of course, this is where the tightrope walk comes into play again. Care, but don’t
care too much. Be involved but not too much.
The reason is that pro football, while a game, is also a business. As such,
cold-hearted decisions must be made. Cold-hearted decisions you want to make about an
associate not a good friend.
A coach can’t have any friends on the roster when deciding playing time.
This past season, Broncos head coach Mike Shanahan had to make the decision to put RB
Olandis Gary on the inactive list because of massive depth at the position. This happened
despite the fact that Gary rushed for 1,159 yards as recently as 1999.
"As I told Olandis, it’s really tough because of what he’s done for us
as a player," Shanahan said. "He’s been very impressive. But when we talk
about the third-team running back, are we better off to have him play special teams or
another position to play special teams? I’ve got to do what’s best for the team.
It doesn’t mean I don’t respect him. I think he’s a great back."
If you think this type of decision is a new offshoot of football increasingly becoming
a business because of free agency, the salary cap and exploding paychecks, guess again.
In the book "Winning is a Habit," Lombardi, an NFL head coach from 1959 to
’67 and ’69, said, "Football is a hard-headed, cold business. No matter
what a player did last year, if he can’t do it this year he has to go."
Part
1: Setting the tone
Series index |
