SANTA CLARA, Calif. – In the Atlanta stop of his 38-year NFL career, the vagabond Wade Phillips turned around one of the NFL’s worst defenses in his first season in 2002, rode the Michael Vick euphoria train to a playoff berth and stuffed Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers with a 27-7 upset in Lambeau Field.
Then the next season, Vick suffered a broken leg in the preseason, the train derailed and everybody was fired. Seems only fair, right?
“Yeah,” Philips said with sarcasm. “During the season everybody says, ‘You’re losing but you have injuries. This guy’s out. That guy’s out.’ But at the end of the year, they forget all that and say, ‘You didn’t win enough games. So get out of here.’”
Phillips is having the last laugh. After three head coaching jobs, three interim head coaching jobs (including with the Falcons in 2003 after Dan Reeves’ late-season firing in 2003) and eight defensive coordinator stints, the 68-year-old is back in the Super Bowl, coaching the NFL’s best defense in Denver.
“You think I’m the oldest who’s ever done this?” Phillips asked, smiling?
He went 26 years between Super Bowl appearance, the previous coming in his first incarnation as the Broncos’ defensive coordinator in 1989. But as he said, “That’s pretty good. There’s 32 teams so really I should only get there every 32 years.”
Denver’s defense led the NFL by almost every measure, including fewest yards allowed (283.1 per game) and total sacks (52). The Broncos beat up Ben Roethlisberger (three sacks) and Tom Brady (four), hitting Brady a season-high 23 times, 11 more than he had been hit in any game this season.
Yes, it helps to have DeMarcus Ware and Von Miller as pass rushers and Aqib Talib and Chris Harris Jr. as cornerbacks. But Phillips has a resume of success that hasn’t tailed off in his senior years. There are no senior moments. He relates to players four decades his junior.
After the AFC title win over New England, he quoted Drake: “I like Drake because I started from the bottom and now I am here.” Players were stunned.
His father was the legendary “Bum” Phillips. His Twitter handle: @SonOfBum. He frequently flashes his dad’s comedic gene. When he wasn’t retained in Houston after the in-season 2013 firing of Texans coach Gary Kubiak (now his boss again), Phillips Tweeted: “To Texan suite sales. I am sorry but because of recent changes I will not renew my purchase of a suite. Hope u understand. Wade Phillips.”
Phillips cracks, “I was a lousy head coach. But I’m pretty good at defense.” Actually, the first part of that isn’t accurate. He was a head coach for three teams (Denver, Buffalo, Dallas) and made the playoffs five of nine seasons.
On his three interim jobs, he said, “They’re all the same. You’re losing and you’re just trying to get everybody to play hard.”
Phillips took over the Falcons when they were 3-10. He went 2-1. How?
“Vick came back,” he said.
He wasn’t kept. But San Diego hired him as coordinator, then Dallas took him as a head coach, then Houston as a coordinator again, then back to Denver.
He was out of work in 2014. Went crazy. He’s not the relax and start a vegetable garden kind of guy.
“I really don’t have any hobbies and my wife says I never do anything around the house.”
Denver got smoked by Seattle 43-8 in the Super Bowl two years ago, and team executive John Elway is not a patient man. He fired coach John Fox after last year’s quick playoff exit and hired Kubiak. Then they hired Phillips.
Elway: “One thing that struck me in the interview with Wade was when he said, ‘I was a good head coach, but I’m a great defensive coordinator. I want to be known as the greatest defensive coordinator in this league.’”
Denver beat Tom Brady and New England twice this season. The dominant defensive performance for the AFC title prompted post-game praise from Bill Belichick. Phillips downplayed the remarks but said, “They (critics) were bringing out that my defense could never beat (Brady). But really, it wasn’t my defense, it was our players.”
He has moved around a lot (“I don’t think I’ve lived anywhere longer than six years”) but as a coach’s son he was used to that.
“When my dad was a high school coach in Amarillo we lived across the street from the school,” he said. “I knew we’d be moving to El Paso because he just got the UTEP job but I didn’t know it would be right away. Somebody in school told me to go see the principal and as I’m walking to the office I look out the window and I see the moving van in front of our house.”
What’s next for Phillips?
“Well, I hope to get through this week,” he said.
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