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Coaches: pressure whets their whistle

Many of the NFL's sideline generals love their jobs to the point that they crave the high expectations and 18-hour days.

By RICK STROUD

© St. Petersburg Times, published March 28, 2001

PALM DESERT, Calif. -- No workaholic worth his whistle in the NFL would be driven enough to swap alarm clocks with Raiders coach Jon Gruden, who is holed up in a dimly lit office hours before sunrise.

Not even the rolling blackouts in California can change the nocturnal habits of the league's leading candidate for burnout.

"Jon Gruden is a great example. I look at him, and I laugh," Chiefs coach Dick Vermeil said. "He's so much like I was. I just couldn't turn it off.

"He gets there at 4 o'clock in the morning. I didn't come in at 4 o'clock; I was still working there at 4 o'clock."

In an era of free agency, salary caps, scouting combines, minicamps, off-season workout programs and increased pressure to win by owners who have paid as much as $800-million for a franchise, NFL coaches are working in an even more intense pressure cooker.

Last season marked the first time in 22 years that two coaches quit during the season. Lions coach Bobby Ross, 63, shut it down after a 23-8 loss to the Dolphins left his team 5-4.

Bengals coach Bruce Coslet quit after an 0-3 start. Chiefs coach Gunther Cunningham told his team after an opening day loss that he had talked to his wife about quitting. Jets coach Al Groh chose returning to his alma mater, Virginia, after one season as an NFL head coach.

For that matter, you might take into account Hall of Fame coaches who have given up their whistles -- Jimmy Johnson with the Dolphins, who coached one more season after announcing his retirement in 1998; and the Jets' Bill Parcells, who moved to the front office a year ago.

"I think the job is tougher. There's no question, it's a year-round deal now," said Gruden, at 37 the youngest coach in the NFL. "You're at the Pro Bowl. The next thing you know, you're at the combine. Pretty soon the off-season program starts. It is hard. But it's exciting. I wouldn't have it any other way."

Eighteen years ago, Vermeil became the symbol of burnout when he quit the Eagles after his team finished 3-6 in the strike-shortened 1982 season. A self-described workaholic who slept in his office, he spent 14 years away from coaching before returning to the Rams, only to quit again after leading them to a Super Bowl XXXIV victory in January 2000.

Once again, Vermeil vowed that his coaching career had ended. But two months ago, he was convinced by general manager Carl Peterson, a longtime friend, to coach the Chiefs at age 63.

"I did what I thought was right for my family. And you also get home and find out your family is very, very busy," Vermeil said. "Their lives don't change. You have to fit into their schedule.

"Carl Peterson came to see me on Jan. 2. On Jan. 1, I told him ... he was wasting his time. He knows everything I like and made it very hard to turn down. He knew I missed the leadership. He knew I missed the relationships. He knew I missed the game."

In his golden years, Vermeil has learned the value of delegating coaching and game-planning duties and spending more time as the motivational leader.

"In Philadelphia, I never felt really good about doing anything unless I was doing it myself," Vermiel said. "Coming back and having been away for so long, of course I couldn't do it the same way. I invested more time in being a leader and less time in being a technician."

No doubt the biggest change for coaches in the past decade has been the advent of free agency and the constraints of a salary cap. Not only is it harder for coaches to develop continuity with players, fans and owners have come to believe the system can make any team instantly competitive.

"It's probably harder to hold a team together, and it's more difficult than when I left (the Cowboys) because the salary cap was just coming into play," Browns coach Butch Davis said. "I remember the very first meeting that (Cowboys owner) Jerry Jones walked in and said, "Okay, boys, we've got $32-million, here's who we've got, you guys decide who you want to get rid of.' Then he walked out.

"We had some great, great second-team players play important roles when we won those Super Bowls. But we were going to have to get rid of a lot of the depth and maybe some of the starters just to hang onto Troy (Aikman) and Emmitt Smith and Michael Irvin and Charles Haley."

Colts coach Jim Mora, who left the Saints in the middle of the '96 season after a famous post-game tirade, said there always has been pressure to win.

"I think it's tough, but I've been a head coach for a long time, and it's never been easy," Mora said. "People say free agency, impatient owners, salary caps, players making a lot of money, all that stuff makes it harder. But I took losses in '86 just as hard as I do now."

Despite the pressures, there are obvious rewards. Multimillion-dollar salaries, for one.

There is no shortage of young coaches wanting to take the place of burned-out ones. Consider Davis, who left a potential lifetime post at the University of Miami to return to the NFL.

"I missed the competition," Davis said. "Every single week, it's the biggest challenge you can have. It really gets the competitive juices flowing. There were challenges in college, don't get me wrong. But there's something about the speed and the efficiency of the National Football League. It just doesn't get any better."

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