Coaching Confidential: Inside the Fraternity of NFL Coaches

by Myers, Gary

  Payton couldn’t help thinking that on his first big free agent recruiting venture he had lost his man. “I thought we’ve got no chance,” he said.

  Payton salvaged the night with a dinner reservation at Emeril’s, one of the best restaurants in the French Quarter. The next morning, Brees was on a flight to Miami, which was considered his preferred destination. The Dolphins also were considering former Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper, whose season ended in 2005 when he tore three knee ligaments. Even so, the Dolphins doctors considered Culpepper less of a medical risk than Brees, and Miami never offered Brees a contract. It was a decision that sent the franchise reeling. Instead of signing Brees, whose shoulder was fully healed in time for him to participate in training camp, they sent a second-round draft choice to the Vikings for Culpepper, who started and played in only four games in his single season with the Dolphins, which was cut short by shoulder and knee problems.

  One week after Payton got lost driving him around New Orleans, Brees called back to say he was accepting the Saints’ offer.

  “I just felt that energy in New Orleans,” Brees said. “From the very beginning there was a genuine feeling that they wanted me there. They believe I can come back from this shoulder injury and lead them to a championship. They were as confident as I am, and that meant a lot.”

  Brees signed a six-year $60 million contract. The only risk was the $8 million signing bonus. Once Brees showed he was healthy, and that didn’t take very long, he was a bargain.

  He led the Saints to the NFC championship game in his first season in New Orleans and was the Super Bowl MVP in his fourth season. He was devastated when Payton was suspended in 2012 and has come to his defense. Payton reached out to Bill Belichick to consult with him on how to handle the public side of the fallout from the scandal. Belichick once was fined $500,000 by Goodell after the Patriots were caught videotaping opponents’ defensive signals, a violation of NFL rules. Goodell did not suspend Belichick, although the punishment would have fit the crime.

  “Once you get to the top of the mountain, you’ve got to begin the journey to go back up,” Payton said.

  He was talking about his team. He could have been talking about himself.

  THE PHONE CALL

  Joe Gibbs caught the football world looking the other way in 2004 when he finally relented to the full-court press put on by Redskins owner Daniel Snyder and jumped out of the NASCAR pits to come out of retirement and coach the Redskins once again. Snyder idolized Gibbs as a kid growing up in Silver Spring, Maryland, and purchased the team in 1999, seven years after Gibbs left. It had been more than ten dreary years for the ’Skins without Joe.

  The Redskins were in serious need of instant credibility by 2004. Snyder was only thirty-three years old when he became the owner. With his tender age, lack of experience in the football business, and abrasive personality, he quickly developed a reputation as an impetuous and impossible person to work for and a man no coach would want in control of his football future.

  Gibbs was an icon. He had won three Super Bowls with the Redskins and had done it with three different quarterbacks: Joe Theismann, Doug Williams, and Mark Rypien. His third Super Bowl followed the 1991 season. In 1992, Gibbs formed the Joe Gibbs Racing Team, and after spending one more year with the Redskins, he decided to devote all his attention to NASCAR. The Redskins promoted defensive coordinator Richie Petitbon to replace Gibbs, but he was gone after one season when Washington went a dismal 4–12. Next, Jack Kent Cooke went outside the organization for Norv Turner, who had just helped the rival Cowboys win Super Bowls two years in a row. His work in developing Troy Aikman was instrumental in returning Dallas to prominence.

  By the time Snyder became Turner’s boss, he was entering his sixth year as the Redskins’ coach and had not made the playoffs. It’s inevitable in the NFL that coaches will be fired, especially when a new owner puts down a good chunk of his life savings and expects instant gratification. The clock was ticking on Turner the moment Snyder signed the last piece of paper on his purchase. He received a stay of execution when the Redskins made the playoffs in Snyder’s first season and then won a playoff game, but he was gone with three games to go in 2000. Snyder had been looking for the right time to fire Turner, and that came after a loss to the Giants that made the team’s record 7–6. Terry Robiskie finished out the 8–8 season as the interim coach.

  Snyder went for a big name when he hired Marty Schottenheimer, but when a power struggle ensued after another 8–8 season, Schottenheimer was fired. Snyder thought he won the lottery when he hired Steve Spurrier, who just ten days earlier had surprisingly resigned after twelve years coaching at the University of Florida, his alma mater. Spurrier built a powerhouse in Gainesville and had been highly sought after in the NFL, but he repeatedly refused to leave the comfort zone he established in Florida. Besides, coaching in the NFL would drastically reduce the number of tee times Spurrier could fit into his schedule during the season and in the off-season. Spurrier lasted only two years in Washington—7–9 and 5–11—and left when it was clear that NFL coaching life was not for him: training camp, the regular season, the NFL Combine, free agency, the draft, minicamps, organized team activities (OTAs)—that didn’t leave a big window for setting up tee times. He made $10 million for his twelve victories and soon was back in college coaching at South Carolina.

  Now Snyder was in a jam, and his idol bailed him out. He found Gibbs at a time in his life when he was willing to get back into the grind. Not surprisingly, Gibbs was successful in the racing business. His team won the Sprint Cup Series in 2000 and 2002, and by 2004 Gibbs felt comfortable relocating back to Virginia from Charlotte. Could his Redskins enjoy the same success again?

  Snyder made him the highest paid coach in the NFL with a five-year $28.5 million deal. For that price, he also bought himself a lot of goodwill with Redskins fans. Gibbs was beloved in Washington. Snyder was not, but he hit a home run. It was an excellent public relations move even if there were doubts about Gibbs’s ability to recapture his old magic after being gone so long. It wasn’t the first time Snyder had tried to persuade Gibbs to come home and save the Redskins. Now he was going to get his chance, and even after being out of football for the last eleven seasons, he was a better choice than Jim Fassel, Dennis Green, and Ray Rhodes, the other candidates interviewed. Gibbs brought instant credibility.

  The money was great, and Gibbs hired his son Coy to be on his staff. Coy wanted to get into coaching, and this gave Gibbs a chance to ease his son into the business and keep his family close to him. But he also was putting his reputation on the line by giving this another shot. He was already in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Anything short of a fourth Super Bowl title to go with the three Vince Lombardi Trophies that were sitting in the lobby at Redskins Park would be a disappointment.

  “There is no net,” Gibbs said. “I am hanging. There is nothing down there to catch us. That may be the biggest thrill. Knowing how hard it is and to get the chance to do something super-hard. It’s probably going to be one of the toughest deals you can imagine.”

  At his introductory news conference on January 8, 2004, many of Gibbs’s former players came by to lend their support, including Darrell Green, Art Monk, and Gary Clark. Gibbs spoke for forty-five minutes without naming one current Redskins player. He had a lot of catching up to do. But he didn’t become one of the all-time best coaches in NFL history by cutting corners. He would put in the hours, Snyder would spend the money, and pretty soon the fans would be singing “Hail to the Redskins” and really mean it.

  Gibbs had a formidable challenge. He had been gone from the league since 1992, and a lot had changed in the way the NFL conducted business. It was a different game. There was free agency and the salary cap. It was the new world of NFL finances and player movement. The Redskins were a dominant team in the twelve seasons Gibbs coached them in Act 1—they made the Super Bowl four times and won three of those games. But now he was inheriting a team that had made the p
layoffs just once in the little more than a decade during which he was gone.

  The good news was that the Redskins were bad enough in 2003 that Gibbs inherited the fifth pick in a draft loaded with talented players. Mississippi quarterback Eli Manning went first to the Chargers, Iowa offensive tackle Robert Gallery second to the Raiders, Pittsburgh wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald third to the Cardinals, and North Carolina State quarterback Philip Rivers fourth to the Giants. The Giants immediately traded Rivers to the Chargers along with picks in the first, third, and fifth rounds for Manning, a daring move that paid off with two Super Bowl titles in Manning’s first eight seasons.

  The three best players left on the draft board when it came time for Paul Tagliabue to announce the Redskins’ pick were quarterback Ben Roethlisberger from Miami of Ohio and safety Sean Taylor and tight end Kellen Winslow from the University of Miami. The Redskins had selected quarterback Patrick Ramsey with their first-round choice in 2002. He was a developing player. That ruled out Roethlisberger, which became a mistake when Ramsey turned out to be a dud and Big Ben won two Super Bowls in his first five seasons. The Redskins gave strong consideration to Taylor and Winslow. They selected Taylor, a phenomenal athlete, perhaps the next Ronnie Lott. Safeties are a low-priority position and usually do not get taken very high in the draft. Lott was the overall eighth pick by the 49ers in 1981, and he began his career at cornerback, a more valued position. But he made the Hall of Fame because he was one of the greatest safeties to ever play the game.

  The Redskins spent a lot of time in Miami with Taylor before the draft and felt confident that he was going to be a big-time player for them. They decided he was their guy. But once they selected him, he was difficult for Gibbs to read. “He was kind of standoffish. It was hard for me to get in contact with him,” Gibbs said. “He wouldn’t return phone calls. Now once you got him on the field, he was great. As a matter of fact, this guy loved football. He felt like he was made to play football. He probably could have been a running back; he could have been a heckuva receiver. We played him some at receiver. He was obviously a great safety. But he also could have been a corner. Real competitive.”

  Taylor’s personality didn’t change much in his rookie year: great player, tough to get to know. But he was the foundation that Gibbs knew he could build his defense around even though Taylor was running into problems off the field. Gibbs suspended him one game his rookie year after Taylor was arrested for driving under the influence, charges that later were dropped. Taylor’s father, Pedro, was the chief of police in Florida City, and so he should have known right from wrong, but he was a young man with a lot of money in his pocket and was still trying to figure things out. The NFL fined him $71,764 for violating the personal conduct policy when he was charged with a felony count of aggravated assault with a firearm for brandishing a gun in 2005. Taylor took a plea agreement of two misdemeanors and received eighteen months probation. He had been fined seven times by the NFL for late hits. He spit on Tampa Bay Buccaneers running back Michael Pittman in a playoff game after the 2005 season. Like a lot of players, Taylor needed to grow up. He came out of Miami after his junior season and was just twenty-one years old when he entered the NFL. The football is always the easy part. It’s being out on their own, the new and vastly improved financial situation, the after-hours temptations—those are the things that often provide the biggest impediment to success.

  Gibbs was not only a great coach but very spiritual. He had a way of reaching his players, even those who seemed lost. Taylor was putting his people skills to the test. “The way you react to him is you’re trying to win him over,” Gibbs said.

  If Taylor felt people around him were trying to take advantage of him and in return he was not trusting, Gibbs at least wanted Taylor to trust him. So Gibbs made a special effort with him. “You get a player like that, and all of a sudden he’s got a lot of money in his deal, so you are trying to work through that,” Gibbs said. “This guy could be a very, very valuable part of what we’re doing here in the future. When you got him on the field, he really was a leader right off the bat. You’re wanting to develop a relationship with him as a coach. Every player is not going to love his coach, but you want his respect and to have a chance. You are kind of wanting all of them to love the Redskins and have a great relationship with you. That’s not going to happen, but you would like to win most of them over.”

  The Redskins were just 6–10 in Gibbs’s first season. Not to worry. He had been only 8–8 in his first season with the Redskins in 1981 after losing the first five games. He won the Super Bowl in his second season. That season was reduced to just nine games as a result of the fifty-seven-day strike, turning the year from the usual marathon into a sprint. Redskins fans knew Gibbs was the real deal when he beat Tom Landry in the NFC championship game and then one week later beat Don Shula in the Super Bowl.

  Once again, in his second act, the Redskins improved in Gibbs’s second season. In 2005, the Redskins were 10–6 and made the playoffs as a wild card. They beat the Bucs in the first round before losing to the Seahawks. Back on the NASCAR circuit, Gibbs’s team won its third Sprint Cup Series championship. It was a good year.

  Gibbs started to notice a change in Taylor before his third season. Taylor had met Jackie Garcia while they were at Gulliver Prep high school in Miami. Taylor was infatuated. She was the niece of the actor Andy Garcia. He came home and told his grandmother about Jackie and said that he had to learn how to speak Spanish. They had a daughter, also named Jackie, in May 2006 after Taylor’s second year with the Redskins. He embraced fatherhood. That changed his demeanor. He also was letting Gibbs into his life.

  “He had his first child, and you’d see him walk around with that little girl,” Gibbs said. “He started coming to our chapel services, and I felt there was real change in his life. The next thing, he walked down the hall and said, ‘Hey coach, how you doing?’ It was just a real change at how he looked at things.”

  Taylor was having his best season in 2007. The Redskins were 5–3 at the halfway point after an overtime victory against the Jets. But late in the third quarter the next week against the Eagles, Taylor sustained a sprained knee. Without him, the Redskins gave up 20 points in the fourth quarter and lost. Taylor told defensive coordinator Gregg Williams that he didn’t expect to be out very long.

  “Hopefully, Sean will be fine,” cornerback Shawn Springs said. “He looked like he’ll be fine. I wouldn’t doubt that he’ll be right back out there.”

  Taylor did not play the next week against the Cowboys in a tough 28–23 loss in Dallas. Terrell Owens caught four touchdown passes from Tony Romo as the ’Boys took advantage of the Redskins being without their best defensive player. Washington had now lost two games in a row and desperately needed Taylor to return to the field. They were in Tampa the next week, and once again Taylor was not healthy enough to play. When the Redskins were losing to the Bucs, Taylor was back home in Miami with Jackie, his fiancée, and their eighteen-month-old daughter, taking care of some personal business with his house, which had been broken into the previous week. It was Thanksgiving weekend. He had arrived in Miami on that Saturday. After watching the Redskins lose their third straight game the next day, he went on a thirty-mile bicycle ride. Maybe that workout would accelerate his return to the field. His team desperately needed him. But he would never play again.

  The knee injury that kept him away from his team would cost him his life.

  The phone call.

  It comes after midnight, and it’s the call every mother and father fear when their children are out of the house. It’s the call every coach fears when his players are not under their control. You can’t watch them 24/7. Nothing much good ever happens after midnight, especially when you are dealing with young men in their twenties, many of whom are millionaires, already with more money than they dreamed they would make in a lifetime.

  Giants coach Tom Coughlin got the phone call in 2008 that Plaxico Burress, who had been a close friend o
f Sean Taylor, accidentally shot himself in the leg on the night after Thanksgiving at a midtown Manhattan nightclub. He never played for the Giants again, and his absence cost them a chance to repeat as Super Bowl champions. The phone rang in the home of Baltimore Ravens coach Brian Billick after midnight, a few hours after the St. Louis Rams defeated the Tennessee Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV in Atlanta in 2000. Billick’s best player, Ray Lewis, was in trouble in Atlanta after a street fight outside a nightclub in upscale Buckhead at 4 a.m. left two men stabbed to death. Lewis and two friends were charged with murder, felony murder, and aggravated assault. Lewis was jailed for nearly three weeks before he was released on $1 million bond. He posted $200,000 in cash. His mother had been waiting for him in Honolulu for Pro Bowl week at the time he was arrested. He never made it. The phone rang so late in the Billick house that he knew there was a problem.