Former Jets coach Michaels dies at 89

NEW YORK >> Walt Michaels, the former New York Jets coach who retired following the 1982 season after leading the team to the AFC title game, has died. He was 89.

The Jets said Thursday that Michaels died Wednesday. The New York Times said Michaels died at a nursing home in Plains, Pa.

The former Browns linebacker was the defensive coordinator of the Jets’ Super Bowl-winning team in the 1968 season. He was head coach from 1977-82, going

39-47-1 and making the playoffs in the

1981-82 seasons. The Jets reached the AFC title game after the 1982 season before losing to the Miami Dolphins.

He later coached the New Jersey Generals of the USFL for two years in 1984-85.

Michaels starred at Washington and Lee University and was a seventh-round draft pick of the Browns in 1951. He was a five-time Pro Bowl player.

Police: Rypien says he hit wife

SPOKANE, WASH. >> Former Super Bowl MVP Mark Rypien recently acknowledged to a Washington state police officer that he struck his wife during a domestic dispute, but his attorney later contended it was in self-defense.

A report by Spokane Officer Todd Brownlee said Rypien acknowledged hitting his wife, Danielle, on June 30. The former Redskins quarterback told police that his wife covered his eyes as he drove and she got the “wind knocked out of her” after he pushed her hands away, The Spokesman-Review reported Thursday.

Rypien announced last year that he believes he suffered brain damage from his time in the NFL that caused him to behave violently at times.

Ex-lineman says he needs transplant

Former Titans All-Pro defensive lineman Albert Haynesworth says on social media that he needs a kidney transplant.

Haynesworth, 38, posted on Instagram that he’s been battling kidney disease. He shared a photo of himself in a hospital bed and wrote that his kidneys failed him Sunday and he’s looking for a donor.

“It’s hard to believe from being a professional athlete to only 8 (seasons into) retirement that my body has taken another major blow,” Haynesworth said in the post.