Full circle for Saleh, former college coach
YOU RECRUIT the boy in his Dearborn, Mich., home, coach him for four years at Northern Michigan, then watch him from afar over the course of 20 years grow into a man and grow into the kind of head coach you regret you never were in a different day and time.
And as you and your wife Penny are sitting in the MetLife Stadium box watching Jets-Eagles with his wife Sanaa and seven children, you cannot take your eyes off Robert Saleh, and do not want to.
“As a coach back in the day, I was more of a barker,” Eric Holm told The Post. “You can’t coach that way as much anymore, positive reinforcement and positivity is kinda the rule of the day. Being the guy at the top of the rung or the country or the company or the team, right, you’ve gotta set the tone, and if you’ve got negative energy it doesn’t work anymore. You’ve gotta have a guy who can stand up there and be positive irregardless.
“And I think he’s that guy. He’s got a gift for it. And I truly believe it’s a gift, to be able to stand tall, right? Suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune when everything’s swirling around you to be able to keep the head up. His overall day-to-day the way he treats people or handles people will pay off in the long run.”
Holm, 62 now, only wishes he could have built interpersonal relationships with his players the way Saleh has during his journey to the Jets sideline. He has over the years felt compelled to reconnect with many of his former players.
“You have regrets,” Holm said. “I didn’t do as good a job with them personally, emotionally as I could have or should have. And I watch Robert and the way he’s doing it and I’m envious. I wish I could have been as good. ... One of his sons asked me in the suite: ‘You coached my dad, how come he’s out there and you’re not?’ I said, ‘I’m not as good as he is. He’s better than I am.’ ”
He beamed with pride every second peering down at his old tight end.
“You look at it as your own kid being out there on that stage and that place ... it’s an overwhelming thing, and I just mean it in a really positive way,” Holm said.
Saleh raged at the officiating on a couple of occasions during the loss to the Eagles. Holm, who grew up a diehard Chiefs fan in Independence, Mo., understood perfectly. He never aspired to be anything other than a coach. He was a walk-on receiver at Truman State (formerly Northeast Missouri State) who wound up coaching at the school before his seven years at Northern Michigan.
“You’re a coach, and you’re fighting for your team, and you’re trying to stand up for your team. That’s all part of the deal,” Holm said. “He keeps his composure and fights for his players. He’s so positive, you can’t help but root for him and pull for him. That’s the hardest I’ve ever pulled for another team outside of the Chiefs. I was sucked in completely.”
Then came the unforgettable postgame reunion 20 years after they last saw each other.
“I know it’s COVID, I probably broke protocol,” Holm said, and chuckled. “I broke through his barrier and gave him a big hug. It was extremely emotional.
“Almost instantaneously it was like all that time was put behind us, and it was very natural and very heartwarming all the way around.”
Saleh was injured as a senior and helped out as a student-coach.
“He was a true tight end back in the day, he could block and he could catch,” Holm recalled. “He wasn’t the fleetest of foot. I see him running those stadium stairs, I think he could play right now the way he moves around. But he was a good player, solid player.”
Watching Saleh coach the 49ers as defensive coordinator in Super Bowl LIV against his Chiefs had Holm conflicted.
“I wanted the Chiefs to win,” Holm said, “but I was so enamored with Robert. I was glued to him.”
It marked the first time Holm had visited New York, and he intends to return.
“It was really the experience of a lifetime,” he said.
Oh, but there was one other regret. “I’d have given anything to bump into Joe Namath,” Holm said, and laughed.
He was 80-50 as a coach, but he measures his success differently now.
“I grew up in the ’60s and ’70s where if the coach said to do this, then that’s what you did, right?” Holm said. “He didn’t tell you why or didn’t pat you on the back too much about it. I didn’t spend enough time getting to understand who they were, understanding what makes them tick, understanding what their life is about. Why they are the way they are. Had I been better at what Robert’s good at naturally, I’d have been better.”
It is always darkest before the dawn, although dawn too often never arrives for the Jets and their long-suffering faithful.
Saleh’s old college coach promises Jets fans that dawn will be dawning.
“Things will get better,” Holm says. “They’ve got draft picks, they’ve got money. You don’t want to say anything about the players that are there, and he’s not gonna say anything about the players that are there, right? You can’t just wave the magic wand.
“You’ve got a guy in charge who’s eternally optimistic, who people want to play for, people want to work for. And these days, that’s such a large part of the battle. And you’ve gotta give him time to remake and reshape the roster. Then you have injuries on top of that.
“His eternal optimism and positivity and ability to communicate will win out in the end. Will win the day. That’s what I believe. If I was coaching again, I’d try to emulate him. And I told him that.”
And he sent his old tight end a text this week, maybe as much for himself as for Saleh:
“Better days ahead.”