Thoughts on Red Miller (Broncos)

[7DnBrnc53]

As others have mentioned, Miller was an offensive coach. The defense was run by Joe Collier, who was retained from Ralston.

He seems like the football equivalent of the "let 'em play" baseball manager popular in the early 1980s. Jim Frey with the 1980 Royals and 1984 Cubs, Harvey Kuenn with the 1982 Brewers, Joe Altobelli with the 1983 Orioles. Manager inherits a team from a higher pressure manager. Low pressure manager keeps the system in place with less pressure. It works great... for a year. Then declining performance thereafter, as the low pressure manager is less adept at fixing problems or replacing aging players.

As mentioned, Miller's "signature" of a stable of mediocre running backs was not effective. The team got worse every year after 1977. He seems to have lacked player evaluation skills and front office savvy as well.

There is also a college sports equivalent to the "let 'em play" manager: The 2001 Miami Hurricanes football team.

They go from Butch Davis (who was strict, but turned the program around and was building a dynasty before he idiotically went to Cleveland) to Larry Coker, the equivalent of the throw out the ball-style Phys Ed teacher.

They won in 2001, and were robbed a year later, but they haven't played for the Natty since.

Also, as far as Denver is concerned, it seems that Reeves kept that mediocre stable of RB's going during his tenure in Denver. They had Larry Canada, Dave Preston and Rob Lytle (they also had former 1,000 yard rusher Tony Reed in 1981), and later they had guys like Nate Poole, Gerald Willhite, Gene Lang, Tony Boddie, Rick Parros, and Sammy Winder. He didn't get what Dr. Z would call the "keynote" runner until 1989 and Bobby Humphrey.

[Jay Z]

As others have mentioned, Miller was an offensive coach. The defense was run by Joe Collier, who was retained from Ralston.

He seems like the football equivalent of the "let 'em play" baseball manager popular in the early 1980s. Jim Frey with the 1980 Royals and 1984 Cubs, Harvey Kuenn with the 1982 Brewers, Joe Altobelli with the 1983 Orioles. Manager inherits a team from a higher pressure manager. Low pressure manager keeps the system in place with less pressure. It works great... for a year. Then declining performance thereafter, as the low pressure manager is less adept at fixing problems or replacing aging players.

As mentioned, Miller's "signature" of a stable of mediocre running backs was not effective. The team got worse every year after 1977. He seems to have lacked player evaluation skills and front office savvy as well.

There is also a college sports equivalent to the "let 'em play" manager: The 2001 Miami Hurricanes football team.

They go from Butch Davis (who was strict, but turned the program around and was building a dynasty before he idiotically went to Cleveland) to Larry Coker, the equivalent of the throw out the ball-style Phys Ed teacher.

They won in 2001, and were robbed a year later, but they haven't played for the Natty since.

Also, as far as Denver is concerned, it seems that Reeves kept that mediocre stable of RB's going during his tenure in Denver. They had Larry Canada, Dave Preston and Rob Lytle (they also had former 1,000 yard rusher Tony Reed in 1981), and later they had guys like Nate Poole, Gerald Willhite, Gene Lang, Tony Boddie, Rick Parros, and Sammy Winder. He didn't get what Dr. Z would call the "keynote" runner until 1989 and Bobby Humphrey.

Reeves had Winder. Winder was kind of the opposite situation. An unexplosive RB who was used fairly heavily because they had no one else they liked.

The Miller deal was more of a baffling quirk.

[BD Sullivan]

Sam Rutigliano went with Saban from Maryland to the Broncos, then was part of Fairbanks' staff in 73.