Don Shula is one of the legendary coaches in the history of the NFL.
His influence is still felt in professional football.
Now, Don Shula is rolling over in his grave over what a Dolphins legend revealed about him.
Don Shula used old-school coaching to achieve greatness
Former Baltimore Colts and Miami Dolphins head coach Don Shula redefined greatness during his time in the NFL.
He holds the NFL record with 347 wins as a head coach during the regular and the postseason.
Shula led the 1972 Miami Dolphins to a perfect 17-0 season that was capped off with a 14-7 victory over the Washington Redskins in Super Bowl VII.
The 1972 Dolphins are still the only team in NFL history to have a perfect season.
Shula was born outside of Cleveland, Ohio, and served in the Army National Guard during the Korean War.
His teams were always among the least penalized in the NFL during his legendary career.
Shula ran tough practices and emphasized discipline to cut down on errors.
He embodied the old-school coaching mentality of rubbing some dirt on it and getting back out there.
But coaching has changed in the 21st century.
Don Shula’s coaching style in modern football
Former Miami Dolphins fullback Larry Csonka was one of the stars of the undefeated 1972 team.
He appeared on Outkick’s The Ricky Cobb Show where he was asked if Shula’s hard-nosed style would work in today’s NFL.
“He was a very demanding, perfection-seeking head coach that would not take no for an answer,” Csonka said about Shula. “So, he was inescapable. He decided everything from when you were coming in, to what your weight was, to how you hiccup, to how you put your hand up on the sideline. He let no detail go astray. And until you realize that that formula works, when we started it made it more tolerable, but coach Shula first got there and started demanding all of that in coaching that way, there was a lot of people looking for the first bus out of Dodge.”
The Dolphins were one of the worst teams in the American Football League (AFL) before the 1970 merger with the NFL.
Shula led the team to a 10-4 record and a playoff appearance during his first season.
Csonka said that the team bought into Shula’s demanding coaching after they began to see results.
“We were the worst team in the NFL when he got here,” Csonka recalled. “In just one year, he started to turn us around. By the third year, we were headed for the Super Bowl. Think about that: the worst team in the NFL and then two to three years later you’re going to the Super Bowl. We didn’t win it, we lost it, but we went back.”
Csonka did not think that Shula’s coaching style would be accepted in the NFL today.
“I don’t know if you could even do that today,” Csonka explained. “I don’t even know if his type of coaching would even fit in the NFL today. It certainly would be a square peg in a round hole. … When we started to win, it became easier to accept his demands, because when you start to win, and you start to win consistently to where you start to have faith in the team, and it starts to develop, it’s like a plant growing. Suddenly it starts to relish the sunlight, it starts to reach for it more and more.”
The old-school demanding coaching style would not fly with most players in today’s NFL.
DeSantis Daily will keep you up-to-date on any developments to this ongoing story.
