Military stint helped Gideon along path to UH
Assistant coach lived out part of his dream, gained greater respect for sacrifices made
Even after a lifetime of playing football, Blake Gideon felt he had another calling.
“I had something tugging on me in my life that I knew I wanted to do,” said Gideon, the University of Houston nickel backs coach and special teams coordinator.
After a decorated career as a safety at the University of Texas, Gideon bounced around NFL practice squads in Arizona and Denver. About to begin a second season with the Broncos in 2014, Gideon came to the realization if he was going to pursue his dream, it had to be while he physically could.
Gideon walked into thenBroncos coach John Fox’s office and officially walked away from football.
“I retired from football on a Friday,” Gideon said.
Two days later, Gideon enlisted and began basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. The mission: Special Tactics and Combat Control, an elite unit that specializes in missions “to enhance air operations deep in enemy territory or in remote locations in rugged terrain,” according to the U.S. Air Force website.
Gideon became interested in special ops while teammates at Texas with Nate Boyer, an Army Green Beret who did multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Really, I always had an interest in the service, but I didn’t know enough,” Gideon said. “Now being around those guys they were able to tell me exactly what to do. I was sold and wanted to do that while I still had miles on my legs.”
Gideon said going through basic training was an eye-opener.
“I thought I had things figured out,” he said. “I thought I was a pretty physical guy, that I was in shape and a pretty tough guy. That certainly woke me up.”
Toward the end of basic training, however, Gideon’s history of injuries finally caught up with him. A year earlier, the Broncos told him he needed surgery on both shoulders.
“At the end of the day my body didn’t hold up,” Gideon said. “I think I knew as much as I wanted to fight it and wanted to convince the Surgeon General at the Air Force on that base that I could fight through it, I was fooling myself.
“That was heartbreaking because of what I gave up to be there, and then being told no matter how good you do this is a liability on the military’s part, which I understand. I don’t have any regrets. I’d do it all the same.”
Gideon, now 30, said his brief stint in the military gave him an even greater respect for sacrifices made.
“What that did for me is that grew my respect for those guys and the lifestyle they have to live and the sacrifices they have to make,” he said. “Not just the immediate danger they are faced with but what they have to put their families through in order to live that lifestyle and allows us to live how we are able to live here in the safety of the homeland.”
Six weeks later, Gideon began the next chapter in his life when he joined Will Muschamp’s Florida staff as defensive quality control
assistant. He was a graduate assistant at Auburn for one season and got his first full-time job in 2016 as defensive backs coach/ defensive passing game coordinator at Western Carolina.
After one season at Georgia State, Gideon joined Dana Holgorsen’s staff at Houston. Holgorsen was familiar with Gideon from his playing days at Texas and “liked the fire he brought to the table.” UH’s special teams unit this season has been among the best in the nation, with punter Dane Roy a finalist for the Ray Guy Award and kicker Dalton Witherspoon tied for the school record with 13 consecutive field goals. The Cougars lead the nation with six blocked kicks.
“We’re going to have to try hard to maintain his employment,” Holgorsen said. “He is going to be really sought after. I think he is going to be a superstar in this profession.”