Don Shula learned how to win football championships as a player long before he won them as a coach.
Shula played for the Cleveland Browns in the early 1950s -- a juggernaut built by Paul Brown that played in 10 consecutive championship games. This weekend those Browns are the final installment of the six-part dynasty series on the Talk of Fame Network. Co-host Ron Borges, by the way, recently crowned those Browns as the greatest dynasty in NFL history -- http://www.talkoffamenetwork.com/1950-browns-dynasty-all-time-best/
Shula is the featured guest on this week’s Talk of Fame Network show. He can appreciate the contribution of a head coach, having himself won more games than any coach in NFL history. And he certainly appreciated the contribution to those 1950s Browns by their own Hall of Fame coach Paul Brown.
“I always said he brought teaching into coaching,” Shula said. “He brought the classroom into pro football. He not only wanted you to be physical, he wanted to make sure you knew what you were doing and had a plan as to how you were going to get it done. He was ahead of a lot of old-time coaches who (believed) if you to beat them up physically (you) were going to win the game. He taught you how to do it.”
Shula played with one Hall of Fame quarterback (Otto Graham) and coached three others – Johnny Unitas, Bob Griese and Dan Marino. Four different types of quarterbacks and Shula pinpoints what made each one special.
Graham: “A great athlete. He was running back at Northwestern who Paul Brown made into a T-formation quarterback.”
Unitas: “The toughest guy mentally and physically that I ever coached.”
Griese: “One of the most intelligent players I’ve ever coached.”
Marino: “The best pure passer that’s ever played the game.”
