Washington Redskins coach Vince Lombardi was through by cocktail hour. George Allen stayed late. Joe Gibbs often didn’t go home.
The three legendary coaches’ time cards were vastly different. Yet, if current Redskins coach Jim Zorn wonders why he works more hours than a fire fighter pulling double shifts, he can thank Allen for turning successors into zombies.
Lombardi is the gold standard of success. The Super Bowl trophy is named after him. The Green Bay Packers legend, who spent his last season in Washington before dying in 1970, barely worked Saturdays, ran 90-minute practices and let quarterbacks call their own plays. Lombardi regularly took his staff out for a pre-dinner drink, even once chastizing a trainer for staying late to care for players.
“Lombardi wanted to spend time with his family, too,” said running back Larry Brown, a rookie on Lombardi’s final team. “The more time he spent with us, the less he had with his family. The only time practice ran longer was when we made errors.”
But that style vanished upon Allen’s 1971 arrival. The workday stretched to 16 hours. Allen jogged after practice instead of cocktails. He gave players tape to watch at home, even hiding slips of paper deep in the reel that would prove whether the player really watched it. He didn’t know some players simply fast forwarded film to that spot before rewinding it.
“Allen didn’t want to leave anything to chance,” said quarterback Sonny Jurgensen, who played for both Lombardi and Allen. “He said, ‘If I’m not here doing it, somebody will be getting an advantage over me.'”
Said Brown: “His approach to the game was: You increased your chances of winning by thoroughly preparing for the game. And nobody knew what he meant by the definition of thorough and apparently he didn’t either. He covered everything from A to Z.”
Lombardi’s playbook was essentially five sheets of paper come gamedays, said Brown. Jurgensen still has those gameplans.
“Lombardi said ‘If I haven’t been able to convey what I want them to do, they should fire me now. I’m not doing my job,'” Jurgensen said. “Isn’t that called coaching?”
Allen’s playbook was more the size of the phone book. It even included a play from President Nixon.
“Lombardi said it was your responsibility to know what to do,” Brown said. “Jurgensen, under George Allen’s system, was spitting out paragraphs.”
By Gibbs’ 1981 arrival, coaches were now working longer. Gibbs was a poor time manager, often joking and telling tales with other coaches for hours after practices before settling down for a very late-night finish. Gibbs would sleep on the office couch before rising mid-mornings when players were already lifting weights.
It wasn’t that Gibbs worked so much more than Allen or contemporaries. Successor Norv Turner often worked 15-hour days — he just started at 5 a.m. to still see his children before bedtime. Three Lombardi trophies immortalized Gibbs’ late nights as the standard, though.
“Gibbs followed Lombardi and [Dallas coach Tom] Landry in his own style,” said linebacker Sam Huff, the Redskins longtime broadcaster who ended his Hall-of-Fame career under Lombardi. “They’re tremendous leaders. There’s something about them that comes across to the ballplayers. You want to play for them.”
Coach Steve Spurrier was more of a CEO during his 2002-03 stint with Washington. He was known for playing more golf than practicing at Florida, despite winning a national title. Spurrier limited golf to the offseason with the Redskins, though he did call in his resignation to owner Dan Snyder from a golf course.
Longtime Washington Star Redskins beat writer Steve Guback likened Spurrier to former All-Pro quarterback Otto Graham, who, as the Redskins coach from 1966-68, “was too loose, a loose cannon and players didn’t have that much respect for him. He was a jokester.”
Perhaps Spurrier’s most memorable line, and there were many during his 12-20 tenure, was over New Orleans coach Jim Haslett’s reputation as a follower of Allen’s and Gibbs’ long schedules. The Saints weren’t winning, though.
“How’s that working out for him?” joked Spurrier.
Let’s just say Haslett had some choice words for Spurrier during an NFL meetings encounter. Haslett is now a coach in the new UFL while Spurrier returned to the easier schedule of a college coach at South Carolina.
Maybe they have banker’s hours in college, but thanks to Allen and Gibbs, the lights rarely dim in NFL offices.
Rick Snider has covered local sports since 1978. Read more at TheRickSniderReport.com or e-mail [email protected].
