One of the reasons Brian Daboll has been such a resounding success and taken the Giants to the playoffs in his first season as an NFL head coach is that he has also been a failure.
His climb through the ranks was not steady and direct. He rose. He fell. He put down roots only to have them yanked out. He was promoted for jobs well done and replaced when the job was not done.
Daboll at age 47 is where he is, days away from the first postseason appearance for the Giants after five barren years, because when the Giants came calling, he was ready, not only to accept the position, but to actually thrive in it. His previous 25 years in the profession — 21 in the NFL — steeled and sharpened him for the demands of a role that can take those who fill it in diabolically different directions.
Take it from one who knows.
“There’s no question about it, there’s things you have to go through,’ Tom Coughlin said.
So says the coach who most recently brought a Lombardi Trophy to the glass-enclosed showcase in the lobby of the Giants’ facility, He actually added two of them to the display. Coughlin appreciates the way Daboll got here.
Brian Daboll at Giants practice on Wednesday. Charles Wenzelberg / New York PostDaboll thought he was ready before this. As it turns out, his big chance came at precisely the right time.
“I would tell you, I always thought I would be ready, whenever that was,’’ Daboll told The Post this week during a brief break from his playoff preparation, “and I’m so thankful that I didn’t, because I wasn’t.’’
Coughlin set a goal for himself to be a head coach at a high-level college program or the NFL by the time he was 45. He was no wunderkind skyrocketing upward. Coughlin spent 15 years in the college game before he made it to the NFL with the Eagles in 1984 as a wide receivers coach. That lasted two years before Marion Campbell was fired and Coughlin had to move. His stay with the Packers lasted only two years, as Forrest Gregg left Green Bay to become the head coach at SMU.
Coughlin was on the coaching carousel, spinning the way so many of these assistants do, hanging on, enduring a dizzying ride. It is no wonder Wink Martindale, the grizzled 59-year-old Giants defensive coordinator with head-coach aspirations of his own, says, “In coaching, we’re gypsies anyway.’’
After three years (and one Super Bowl triumph) working with receivers for Bill Parcells and the Giants, Coughlin finally made it, hired as the head coach at Boston College — at age 45.
“You learn really fast about your profession and it’s not all glamor,’’ Coughlin, now 76, told The Post, “and how difficult it is. You go home and tell your wife what the situation really is. You pay a price. There is a maturation process, I believe.’’
Daboll was a full participant in his own maturation process.
“Obviously he’s paid his dues,’’ Coughlin said. “He’s a guy that has won and has that aura about him. Brian has been in some great situations. He coached with [Bill] Belichick for what, 12 years? And then he had this really nice thing going in Buffalo. Those are wonderful experiences.’’
Some of these experiences were indeed wonderful, some were less so.
Daboll went through a stretch of eight years where he was with six different NFL teams. He was with the Jets when they fired Eric Mangini. Two years later, Daboll was with the Browns when they fired Eric Mangini (not a misprint). He was with the Dolphins for one year when they fired Tony Sparano. He was with the Chiefs for one year when they fired Romeo Crennel. He had been an offensive coordinator for three different NFL teams but when he returned to Belichick and the Patriots in 2013, he was bumped down to tight ends coach. One season (2017) back in college at Alabama, winning a national championship as Nick Saban’s offensive coordinator, redirected Daboll’s arrow pointing in an upward direction.
Tom Coughlin endured a similar journey as Brian Daboll before becoming a head coach. Getty Images“It took 20-plus years,’’ Daboll said. “Some guys are in the league for three and get an opportunity. I think every journey’s different, mine certainly was a longer one. I’m still fairly young but it certainly took a long time.’’
These are lessons that the 30-something hotshot coordinators in demand in the most recent NFL hiring cycles do not possess. Lessons that grant perspective, wisdom and a sense of how to handle whatever is thrown at them.
“I feel very comfortable in my own skin, if that makes sense, and I don’t know if I could say that 10 years ago, or 15 years ago,’’ Daboll said.
Like Coughlin, Daboll also set a goal for when he wanted to be an NFL head coach.
“It was before 45, I’ll tell you that,’’ he said. “It was before 40.’’
He did not attain his goal in the time he established for himself. It is no wonder when Daboll speaks, often, of the NFL being “humbling’’ it is because he has been humbled while working in it.
His work with Josh Allen and the Bills’ offense got Daboll in the door but he kept getting ushered out. He went through seven interviews the past three years for head-coach positions — including the Jets’ job that went to Robert Saleh.
“You put your best foot forward in those interviews and unfortunately I didn’t get any of ’em,’’ Daboll said. “After you do so many of ’em and you get the call, ‘Hey, wish you luck but we went in a different direction,’ you definitely can get discouraged by it.
Brian Daboll, left, speaks with Rob Gronkowski while on the Patriots staff as an assistant. MediaNews Group via Getty Images“I’m not gonna lie to you, sure, when you get told, ‘No,’ you’re definitely like, ‘Damn, is this ever gonna happen?’ I’m not the oldest guy but I’m not the youngest guy either, the way this league has been going.’’
When Daboll would “bitch and moan’’ his wife, Beth, would scold him that he needed to keep his feet where they were supposed to be, do the best job possible wherever he was and if it happened, it happened.
Coughlin after three seasons at Boston College became the first head coach of the fledgling Jacksonville Jaguars. When he arrived to lead the Giants in 2004, Coughlin brought with him a foundation steeped in success and also a rigidity that needed to be softened. When he did add flexibility into his demeanor, he connected on a more personal level with his players and won Super Bowls after the 2007 and 2011 seasons.
Tom Coughlin speaks as the 2011 Super Bowl-winning Giants team is honored on Oct. 17, 2021. Getty Images“You’ve got to learn about dealing with people,’’ Coughlin said. “You’ve got to have spent a certain amount of time in the classroom with the pro player, with the college player, on a level of trying to make them understand what you believe in and what you think is something that will help them on an individual basis. You’ve got to spend that elbow-grease time. That’s a part of it, too.’’
It took Daboll — 9-7-1 with a Giants team not long ago thought to be one of the worst in the league — time to realize he was not running out of time.
“I’m as thankful — probably more thankful — for the failures than even the successes,’’ he said. “I just think that’s part of my journey. Got a long way to go, I certainly don’t have all the answers right now. I just think I’m where I’m supposed to be, when I’m supposed to be there.’’
Coughlin’s long and winding coaching adventure reached the pinnacle. Daboll’s long and winding coaching adventure is on the way.
