Tom Coughlin’s
Jags VP Coughlin brings discipline, changes culture
tough-love approach has brought the Jaguars to the brink of reaching their first Super Bowl.
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Suffer the pain of discipline or suffer the pain of regret.
The phrase is etched in LED lights inside the locker room of the Jacksonville Jaguars. It may be easily dismissed by the occasional outsider.
The sports world is cluttered with meaningless clichés and false platitudes. But those 11 words perfectly encapsulate the journey of sweat and sacrifice that leads the Jags to the AFC Championship Game against the New England Patriots today.
It began a year ago when the Jaguars fired Gus Bradley and promoted Doug Marrone to head coach. Most importantly, they brought back Tom Coughlin as executive vice president of football operations, his second run in Jacksonville after coaching the team from 1995 to 2002.
Coughlin runs things very sternly, like boot camp, only with football helmets. There are rules for everybody and lines that don’t get crossed, including rules for sports writers covering the team.
Years ago when he was coach, Coughlin embraced the “one team, one voice” rule, which meant his assistants were off limits to the press.
Then-offensive coordinator Kevin Gilbride was amicable enough to invite a few scribes into the weight room for an off-the-record chitchat one day.
And then he saw Coughlin walking in. Panicking, Gilbride scooted the writers behind some weight machines and avoided getting branded a dumbbell who didn’t follow the rules.
It was a touch more painful for rookies Cordell Taylor and Tavian Banks, who were involved in a car accident during the 1998 season. Coughlin fined them $500 each, basing his harsh judgment on the time of the accident, assessing they still would have been late for a team meeting.
Years later, Coughlin came in with his “color inside the lines” mandates again: Players couldn’t wear tinted visors during practice. There was a “five minutes early” rule for practices and functions. White sleeves, black cleats and black socks at practice, and no improvising.
Little things added up to big things as the “lowly” Jaguars — a three-win team just a year ago — advanced to the playoffs as the No. 3 seed in the AFC and beat Pittsburgh in last week’s divisional matchup.
Everyone knew the laissez-faire party rules under Bradley were going to disappear, never to be seen again. General manager David Caldwell warned them as much after making all those changes.
“Everybody had to check their egos when they came through the door,” said defensive end Dante Fowler. “We knew that was going to happen, especially after the year we had last year. With the players we had, it shouldn’t have been like that.”
Marrone is very much a part of the culture change. But just as bad leadership trickles down to the locker room — check out the dysfunctional back-stabbing mess in Pittsburgh under Mike Tomlin — the good trickles up in Jacksonville.
Coughlin+Marrone+Caldwell = No more funny business.
“The culture of understanding what it takes to win? For a team that has not won anything in five years? It’s not easy. It’s not an easy thing,” Coughlin said during the preseason. “So practices are 2½ hours long. They’re fully padded. They’ll be in the heat. There’s a lot of contact. You work your way into the understanding that nothing good has ever been accomplished without sacrifice — sacrifice, self-denial and discipline, the discipline that goes with it.”
Coughlin has not spoken to the media since those days, sticking to his “one voice” rules that allow Marrone to be the team’s official spokesperson. But his voice resonates loudly in the locker room.
“The importance placed on winning is something that was not necessarily as high of a priority in the past,” said quarterback Blake Bortles, who starred at Oviedo High and UCF. “I think since the time Doug and Coughlin got here, that is all everything has been about. How can we win as much as possible and as consistently as possible? If we are doing anything that is not helping us win, then why are we doing it?
“I think the discipline and the structure that has kind of been implemented here has really helped out with the locker room and to keep this whole thing rolling in the right direction.”
One more game, one more obstacle remains, before the Jaguars secure their first berth in the Super Bowl.
The Patriots won’t back down lightly, even with concerns that quarterback Tom Brady is not 100 percent with a hand injury. The Patriots started the week as nine-point favorites.
Regardless, the odds were never in Jacksonville’s favor anyway.
Bleacher Report listed them as 100-1 odds to reach the Super Bowl. The Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook had them at 80-1.
But here’s another fun stat: Coughlin is 5-2 lifetime against Patriots coach Bill Belichick, including two Super Bowl victories as coach of the New York Giants.
Coughlin would be the first to say it’s not about him, but we know better. It’s all about him.
It’s easy to hear him say: “Suffer the pain of discipline or suffer the pain of regret.”
It’s made it much easier to believe in the Jacksonville Jaguars, long-time lowly paupers a year ago, who are now ready to take down the kings of the NFL.