Two Coaches

So this season both head coaches for my football teams have retired. Last month, Lloyd Carr announced he was stepping down after 13 years as the head coach at Michigan, where he won a national championship and five Big 10 titles. Today, Joe Gibbs retired from his second stint as the head of the Washington Redskins; after winning three Super Bowls the first time around, he came back to lead the team into the playoffs twice in four years.

There are similarities, I think, to both situations. Both Carr and Gibbs were larger-than-life coaches who achieved the top success with nationally prominent teams, and then in later years had to deal with charges that the game had passed them by. In both cases, there may have been some truth to that, but what I'll always remember from both men is they way they represented their school/team. I always knew, no matter what, that the Wolverines and Redskins would come to play. Sure, they didn't always win, but I never questioned the heart of a Gibbs team or a Carr team.

And both coaches went out with a final statement. Everyone expected Michigan to get waxed by Florida this year in their bowl game; instead, Lloyd Carr led the Wolverines to a wild, wonderfully improbable 41-35 win over the Gators. Meanwhile, Joe Gibbs, faced with four straight must-win games to get into the playoffs, coached the team to wins in all of them, and then played the Seahawks tough until the final few minutes. All of this with a team dealing with the horrible death of Sean Taylor.

In sports today, there seems to be way to much of a "win it all or else..." attitude among fans that I really can't stand. Teams that don't win championships every year are called losers, coaches that don't win championships every year are called incompetent. Nonsense. Give me the teams these men fielded any day of the week. Always competitive, always classy, and often winners. That's what I want out of the teams I root for.

So whether it's Lloyd Carr talking about another "tremendous" effort by the Michigan team, or Joe Gibbs saying "Well, I'll tell ya'..." at the start of every interview, I'll miss them both. Thanks, Coach Carr; thanks, Coach Gibbs.

Next fall is going to be interesting indeed....