Wade Phillips, one of the best defensive coordinators of all time, gears up for another Super Bowl shot

There isn’t much that Denver Broncos defensive coordinator Wade Phillips hasn’t seen on the football field.

Thirty-eight years on NFL sidelines will do that to you.

“You know, you’ve got a one in 32 chance, once every year with 32 teams, so to get more than once is pretty good,” Phillips said with a smile this week.

And yet this Sunday at Super Bowl 50 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, Philips will get just his second chance of his career to hoist the Lombardi Trophy.

His first came with the same Denver franchise back in 1989 when he was serving in the same capacity as today, defensive coordinator.

It didn’t end too well.

“Not good,” Phillips said when asked of his first Super Bowl memory. “We played against one of the greatest teams of all time [the 1989 San Francisco 49ers], so things didn’t start out well and the harder we tried, the (more behind) we got. That’s about it.”

The final score showed 55-10 in the 49ers favor.

You can bet that Phillips is ready to go for another chance at the championship, having served as a head coach three times and defensive coordinator with eight different teams over the years as one of the best defensive minds in football.

“I got fired from most of those teams, so I don’t know,” Phillips joked. “I think we play well, we play a style of defense wherever I’ve been. Guys have recognized that to give me another job, I guess.”

“Well, I’ve been really lucky going into how many teams now – nine different times I’ve gone in the first year, we’ve been in the playoffs,” Phillips added. “That just doesn’t happen…every team has improved win-wise and usually defensively, too, so I take pride in that.”

Head coach Gary Kubiak certainly saw what was available in Phillips, and despite being the second choice for the job by the coach and Broncos general manager John Elway (behind Cinnicanti Bengal’s coordinator Vance Jospeh who was blocked by his team from accepting the position), it certainly sounds like they made the right choice.

“He brings confidence is what he brings,” Kubiak said this week. “You go back and look at Wade’s career, everywhere he has been, he has been able to turn things around and find some success early. So, I think that talks about his ability to teach…I’m very proud of Wade. He has had a great career as a head coach (and) assistant coach. It speaks for itself. For him to have this opportunity and the job he has done has been excellent.”

Pro Bowl linebacker DeMarcus Ware feels the same way.

“I knew Wade when I was in Dallas, and he always put guys in position to make plays,” Ware said. “He always utilizes the talent that he has. He’s been doing it for a long time, that’s why he’s been so consistent at having great defenses. That’s why this season we were the number one defense in the NFL because he did the right things. So now, I know he has a lot of tricks up his sleeve on what he’s going to bring to this game because now it’s the biggest stage that he’s been on in a long time and that preparation is key and that’s how he instills that in all of the guys, make sure you prepare and when it’s important to you, you’ll do whatever you need to do to get it done.”

One things for certain, after such a long career, Phillips doesn’t take a single thing for granted.

“I’m lucky to be where I am in some ways,” Phillips said. “I think I’ve earned a lot of it, but you still have to be lucky. Just look how this year turned out. I didn’t have a job last year. I thought I was going to get one, guys that thought they were going to get a job didn’t get it. This year, pretty much the same thing was happening and I did get the interview at Washington, didn’t get that job. And I was second place at Denver, but it worked out great for me. Sometimes you’re at the right place at the right time.”

Phillips reached the point he has today thanks in large part to his father, Bum Phillips, who too climbed the ranks of the coaching ladder, earning some success in the NFL.

“Well, I’m my father’s son. That’s for sure,” Phillips said. “I was around football and I was around him my whole life. He was a football coach in high school. I played for him. He shaped much pretty much everything. I learned a lot from other people and the people that were around him were a lot of great coaches so I learned a lot from them. Then, I worked for Buddy Ryan, I worked for Marty Schottenheimer, I worked for Marv Levy, some of the great coaches. I learned a lot from them, too. But, my dad, I said before, he’s my hero and my dad so he influenced me in almost everything.”

His was able to learn from his father’s mistakes (and his own) along the way on his almost 40-year career as well.

“I mean it’s kind of strange my dad was in the league like 16 years and this is my 38th year,” Phillips said. “I’ve learned a lot of things as I’ve gone alone and certainly made a lot of mistakes. He had great common sense. Some guys are great X’s and O’s and he knew that but he had great common sense of when to do things and what things to do. I like to emulate that but it’s hard to do.”

So, would that elusive Super Bowl trophy be the icing on the cake for an already legendary career?

“We’ve been fighting for it for a long time,” Phillips said. “When I started it out (in Houston), I thought it was pretty easy. If we could just beat Pittsburgh, we’re there. And then Oakland beat us (in 1980), on the Super Bowl the next year. Then we all got fired,”

“So yeah, it’s the ultimate. We have what, 83 Hall of Fame players that have never won the Super Bowl, so it’s the ultimate.”