John Madden retired as an NFL head coach in 1978 — but he never stopped coaching. Coaching and teaching football was all he'd ever wanted to do.
"Coaching isn't work," Madden (1936-2021) said as quoted by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. "It's more than a job. It's a way of life. ... No one should go into coaching unless he couldn't live without it. There is much more to it than just enjoying it."
Madden lived a Hall of Fame head coaching career with the Oakland Raiders before becoming the preeminent football analyst. He parlayed that into helping make "Madden NFL" the bestselling football video game franchise.
Football drove him. And he put his life's effort into it. "I am totally consumed by football, totally involved. I'm not into gardening ... or any other hobbies. I don't fish or hunt. I'm in football," Madden had said.
Let Your Passion Evolve Like John Madden
Madden mastered the art of carrying his passion with him, even at different phases of life. Even after he retired from coaching, Madden inserted his coaching mentality into the broadcast booth and video games. He wanted to help football fans enjoy and understand the game better.
When Raiders' owner Al Davis named him head coach at age 32 in 1969, Madden became the youngest person to hold that title at the time. He coached the Raiders from 1969 through 1978. Madden's regular season record is legendary. Never once did the team suffer a losing season. His 0.75 regular season winning percentage is the highest among coaches with 100 career victories.
And he knew how to win the big game. Madden guided the Raiders to a 32-14 victory over the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl XI, in January 1977. He was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2006.
Keep Your Rules Simple
Just as Madden's TV commentary was punchy and fun, so was his coaching style.
"Players loved playing for him," former Raiders Hall of Fame tackle Art Shell told ESPN.com. "He made it fun for us ... all he asked is that we be on time and play like hell."
Those were two of Madden's three main rules. The third was to "pay attention" to him and his coaches during meetings and practices, Madden said.
"Sometimes (coaches) were disciplinarians in things that didn't make any difference," Madden said. "I was a disciplinarian in jumping offside; I hated that. Being in bad position and missing tackles, those things."
John Madden: Use Your Natural Abilities
Madden stood an imposing 6'4" and 250 pounds topped with a mop of reddish hair. Author Peter Richmond described Madden in his Raiders' book "Badasses," this way: "(An) everyman who roamed the sideline looking like a fan who'd wandered onto the field. He seemed to revel in being part of a game, not an industry."
And he used his powerful presence as an asset off the field. In the three decades Madden spent in the broadcast booth, he became the most acclaimed pro football analyst. He won 16 Sports Emmy Awards as event analyst. He covered 11 Super Bowls for four networks until his 2009 retirement.
Overcome Obstacles Like John Madden
Madden faced obstacles, too. After playing football at California Polytechnic State University, Madden was drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles as the 244th player chosen in 1958 NFL Draft.
Madden, though, injured his knee in training camp. While coming to the Eagles' facility early mornings to rehab his injury, Eagles' future Hall of Fame quarterback Norm Van Brocklin mentored him. Van Brocklin, who'd eventually become an NFL head coach, would come in early to breakdown game film. And Madden became his eager student.
"I had a doctorate in football because of Van Brocklin," Madden said, as quoted in "John Madden," by Richmond.
Madden's injury ended his playing career before ever taking a game day snap professionally. But he discovered he wanted to coach. He started coaching high school football. And by 1961, he took a junior college assistant position at Allan Hancock College in Santa Maria, Calif. By his third year Madden was the college team's head coach.
He learned from the greats. He went to coaching clinics conducted by Vince Lombardi and future College Football Hall of Fame coach John McKay. Through these contacts, Madden met Don Coryell. When Coryell became the head coach at San Diego State, he made Madden the team's defensive coordinator.
When Al Davis came to San Diego State looking for assistants to add to Raiders' head coach John Rauch's staff, Madden impressed Davis. He hired Madden as the Raiders' linebackers coach in 1967.
Know What You're Capable Of
Two years later when Rauch left the Raiders, Madden pitched himself as the next head coach.
"I had a plan, because I had been thinking about this basically all my coaching life. Even as an assistant, I'd thought as a head coach," Madden said.
Davis named Madden, at 32 with only two years of pro football coaching experience, the Raiders' head coach. What followed was 10 winning Raiders seasons under Madden, including eight playoff appearances and the Super Bowl Victory. "Teaching is repetition," Madden said. "Coaching is the same way."
"Madden's most basic coaching axiom," Richmond told IBD, "was keep it simple so that even the least cerebral members of the team know what they're doing."
"John Madden knew football," Hall of Fame coach Tom Flores, a Raiders' assistant coach under Madden and his successor, told IBD. "John studied the game, all the nuances."
When Madden retired from coaching the Raiders at 42, he said "I gave it everything I had ... I don't have any more."
Challenge The Status Quo
Before Madden's first broadcast as an analyst in 1979, he asked, "When do we go to watch the teams practice?" Ryan Hockensmith wrote on ESPN.com. The producers told him TV broadcast teams didn't go to practices. Madden said
The TV team told him to watch film. Madden said that wouldn't do. Madden was unmoved and announced "I'll talk to the coaches."
"From that day forward, Madden's broadcast teams went to practice, spoke directly with players and coaches, and were given the same film that coaching staffs used," Hockensmith wrote. "Within six months, it had become standard practice for TV crews."
Take Your Skills To New Mediums
Madden's high standards quickly fueled his popularity. He caught the attention Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins. Hawkins wanted to produce a video football game. And he wanted Madden to help create it and be the face of it.
They met in 1984. "Trip was thinking about a game," Madden told Richmond. "I was thinking about it as a teaching tool. The first thing I said to him was 'I'm not going to do it unless there are 22 men on the (screen).'"
The technology at the time wouldn't allow an 11 on 11 game. Hawkins suggested eliminating some lineman and having 14 players on the screen.
"That's not real football," Madden said. Hawkins told Madden it would take years to get 22 players on the screen. "Then it will take years," Madden replied. The game debuted four years later in 1988.
The "Madden NFL" video game sold more than 130 million copies since its 1988 release and generated more than $4 billion in revenue. As a coach, broadcaster and businessman there was one common thread for Madden in everything he did.
"People always ask, 'Are you a coach or a broadcaster or a video game guy?'" Madden said upon his Pro Football Hall of Fame election. "I'm a coach, always been a coach."
John Madden's Keys
- Head coach of the Oakland Raiders from 1969 to 1978 finishing with one of the top winning records in NFL history. Inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2006 and co-created the "Madden NFL" video game.
- Overcame: Inexperience from being the youngest head coach in NFL history at the time when was hired at 32.
- Lesson: "Coaching isn't work. It's more than a job. It's a way of life. ... No one should go into coaching unless he couldn't live without it."
