First, tell me a bit about where you are right now in your coaching career and what your next steps are?
Well I’m at Ole Miss right now and am really enjoying it. It’s a beautiful town and great people. I’d be happy to finish my career here – 10 years more and call it a day.
You prefer college over NFL coaching? Why if so?
The big thing with college, and it may sound corny, but I got into this business to have an impact on young men and their development. In the NFL you have grown men more set in their ways, so to speak. In college, you have 17 or 18 year old kids. You can have more of an impact on their life. That’s the biggest difference.
Guys mess up at all levels in football – at all levels our job is to correct them. But in the NFL when you close your office doors you don’t have to think about the game. In college it’s 24 hours a day. You have to recruit and watch our for your players more. That’s what makes it difficult. Guys have classes, tutors, you have to deal with alumni and eight million other things recruiting-wise.
Who helped influence you most as a coach and how – understanding your dad I’m sure was a big influence!
I think my dad was my biggest influence. He was the reason I got into coaching. My dad hired Tom Coughlin out of Syracuse and he was a huge influence on me as well. He was on the staff at Boston College when I played.
I looked up to the guys on my dad’s staff in college and saw the comraderie – and frankly, the fun they were having. There was never a doubt that’s what I waned to do.
Any specific approaches you adopted from those experiences?
I emulated ,my dad and Tom Coughlin. The NFL, it’s less about motivation than it is in college. In the NFL players have kids at home and wives telling them they better keep their jobs!
In college, the kids care about going to parties on Friday nights. So the key is motivating guys. I do that by letting them know I care – letting them know I’m working with them so they can be their best. Those are the things that I think motivate them. You become a teacher. If you don’t know what you’re doing in the NFL you’re in big trouble – so keeping your job is your motivation. In college, coaches have to motivate kids more – sometimes just to get them to practice.
You can’t be their friend – that’s a mistake. You have to push them to be the best they can be – but not doing it in a demeaning way. You have to tell them you’re correcting their performance. It’s not about who they are as a person. I think I’m a player’s coach – but you’d have to ask those guys!
Some of the coaches I speak to talk about the concern that they have less time to work with college players and that, because of that and the way the game has changed, technique has suffered a bit at the college level. Any thoughts on this?
I think we would like to have more time, definitely. The problem is that all that they have going on – tutoring, practices, weights, and of course classes. There’s just not as much time for other things.
The college game is much simpler than the NFL. It’s easier to learn. The NFL is getting there. I remember when I got to the Giants it was like getting a PhD versus high school. There was so much you had to learn. I think college coaches have gotten smarter – they’ve simplified things. I think that’s the way to play football anyway. You can make it as difficult as you want it to be but when you have millimeters of a second to diagnose a play, I think simpler makes more sense. It’s more about concepts.
Do you focus more on technique then?
I think we have enough time to work on technique and get it right in college. To get what you want done. Most guys are here four or even five years and we work on technique every day. They should get it by the NFL.
It’s amazing how relative it is. They make mistakes in college and the NFL Guys that stick around though don’t make the same mistakes.
Let’s talk about your NFL career and how you ended up in Pittsburgh?
When I coached with the Giants we won a Super Bowl, but I was an assistant line coach. I wanted to become a head line coach and got a job in Kansas City, but then we were all let go. Then I get the job with the Steelers. I didn’t know Mike Tomlin. But he knew Haley and we had some success in Kansas City running outside zones, and I think that was something he liked.
Lots of injuries that season – tough year?
It was a tough year. I don;’t think Bell played early on, if I remember correctly. We did have injuries, but that’s part of the game. You can’t worry too much about it. Pouncey’s injury was bigger because we didn’t have a backup center so to speak who was ready to go.
What makes a player like Pouncey so special to an offense?
First of all, he is extremely athletic, of course. He’s a perfect guy for an outside zone scheme. He has the quickness to reach people. He was definitely a good player.
The biggest thing is you need someone backing up the center position. We didn’t. Center is an interesting position because you only have one guy who is a true center first. The backup centers have to be more versatile guys that can play center and guard but still can start when a guy goes down.
Was it frustrating when they let you go after just one season?
I think so, yes. That’s the NFL though. I was proud of that season. We started off 0-4, but the guys battled back and we ended up 8-8. If not for a missed field goal on a sunny day in San Diego, we would have gone to the playoffs.
It was frustrating being let go, but it’s one of those deals. I think they just found someone else they thought they wanted more. I don’t want to get into it – I just think they felt like they wanted to make a change. It doesn’t make sense to the person getting changed. But that’s the way coaching has gone. The upsetting thing was that Ian Rappaport said that Shaun Sarertt had taken over the coaching job during the season and that didn’t happen. Shaun was a good guy and a good coach but that never happened.
It’s funny. I thought Mike was a great person before he let me go. I like him. Clearly things change when you’re let go though.
Any last thoughts on your time there?
I was proud of the way the team battled back. I was sitting in the locker room in London after a loss with the guys and they asked if we still had a chance. Mathematically we had a minuscule chance but we kept winning. Those last few weeks a bunch of different things had to happen for us to get into the playoffs but the guys didn’t fold. They kept working.
That last week we beat Cleveland but we needed Kansas City to win, and I knew those guys were resting their starters. I wasn’t paying attention to the game – I didn’t think they would win knowing that. But I got home and saw it was still close in the fourth quarter. My dad said, “Watch, Kansas City is going to drive the ball down the field and kick a winning field goal.” It was a 42-yard field goal on a sunny day in San Diego, but they missed it. It’s amazing all those things that had to happen, and that one last thing, an easy field goal, didn’t happen.
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