Coached

So far my July posts have been a lot of mail day ones.

That will have to be a common thing for this month.

Some of the mail days this month were big and some were small but were all equally great and appreciated.

One of the bigger ones came from P-Town of Waiting Til Next Year blog. As I previously mentioned, there was so much in that mail day, that a breakdown had to happen as it wouldn't all fit into one post. Not even close.

Today we look at a few coach cards I found for a coach PC I don't speak much about. I mostly look for the guys I knew growing up but will add some of the newer coaches of today when cards are made of them. It's definitely becoming a less common thing with smaller checklist sets-most sets seem to have 100 veterans and 50 rookies-and more autograph or material content. It's probably why I don't set collect anymore. As a team collector, I want the team. Give me that head coach, top olineman, punter, kicker, and full back. I want em!

Since those don't exist much, let's take a look at a few I found in a time period where they did.

Marv Levy. I best remember him coaching the Bills through most of the 90's. He took them to 4 straight AFC Championships but couldn't ever win the big one.

Jerry Sloan was an incredible coach for the Utah Jazz. Another coach like Levy however that went to the big game, but couldn't pull off a win. Of course when you face the games greatest player in MJ, that task became a 100 times harder.

Tom Landry on the other hand, big time winner. Landry won two Super Bowl titles (VI, XII), five NFC titles, and 13 Divisional titles. He holds the NFL record for longest tenure with one team.

Another Super Bowl Dallas Cowboy champion coach was Jimmy Johnson. He won two titles with the team as well with the big trio of Aikman, Smith and Irvin and now I watch him on the NFL Fox pregame show. One of the best NFL pregame shows out there.

And finally, Joe Gibbs. He won three Super Bowls all with the Redskins. He did so well that Washington brought him out of retirement in 2004 in hopes he could replicate his performance. Well, I think Joe forgot how much the game changed as he struggled two out of four years and the other two he suffered early playoff exits. But, he still will always be remembered as one of the coaching greats.

 

I also failed to mention he is a NASCAR team owner. Guy has always kept himself busy. He at one time employed one of my favorite racers in Tony Stewart where Stewart won two championships.

I keep wishing there was at least one product for each sport that incorporated coaches. I know Panini did with it's Prizm basketball and that was cool. But, baseball and football need their love soon to. Hopefully one of the companies will read this and jump on it. I am sure I am not alone in wanting at least one expanded product.