Winning in the Trenches by Forrest Gregg

Author:Forrest Gregg
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: eBook ISBN: 9781578604890
Publisher: Clerisy Press
Published: 2010-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Coaching a preseason game with the Cleveland Browns in August 1975. Behind me are assistant coach Rod Humenuik and wide receiver Reggie Rucker.

Greg was a terrific ball player. He was our best running back, our best kick returner, and our best punt returner.

Earlier in the year I put in the short trap. Greg took a look at the play.

“Coach, you want me to run that?” he asked.

“Let me tell you about that play,” I explained, “The key here is to crack the line of scrimmage; once you do, you’ll be in the secondary very quickly. Most of the time you’ll have just the safety to get by, and then it’s one on one.”

I was always getting on Greg in practice about something. It seemed he was always trying to get my goat, and I’d yell some more. It didn’t seem to faze him one bit. In fact, I later learned he liked to laugh about it behind my back. One day after chewing Greg out, I looked at our backfield coach, George Sefcik, and said, “He’s driving me crazy.”

George smiled, “That’s exactly what he’s trying to do.”

I really believe if Greg’s timing had been a little different, had he been on a championship team, that he’d be in the Hall of Fame.

We came out of the gate slowly, with losses to Cincinnati, Minnesota, and Pittsburgh. After the loss to the Steelers in early October, a devastating 42–6 defeat, I got my first real taste of Art Modell. Following the game he spoke with a reporter from the Plain Dealer, saying, “We’ve lost before, but I don’t like to be embarrassed. These have been three terrible, terrible weeks…. I made certain recommendations to Forrest when he became head coach. Some may not have been sound.”

I wasn’t used to this—the owner of the team throwing coaches under the bus. We were struggling offensively and defensively, trying to get on our feet. The worst thing an organization can have is more than one person speaking on behalf of the team.

Despite Modell’s outburst, the losing continued for another six weeks. We’d get close, and we never played anybody that said we didn’t compete with them, but we just couldn’t get beyond it. In the ninth week we were playing at Oakland, a game we lost 38–17. But afterward, the Raider assistants told a few of my coaches that “you guys don’t play like an 0-9 team.”

When those words reached me it made me feel good. We just kept plugging away and the next week we beat the Bengals. That victory gave us the bounce that kept us going for the next two years. In fact we won three of our last five. I think we were a little better than the ’74 team, but our record was a little worse at 3-11. Still, I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. All my energies went towards improving the team, and we were getting better, not by yards but by inches.

That ’75 Browns squad never quit on me, and I admired the hell out of them for that.

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