John Madden is perhaps best known for having his name on one of the most popular video games of all time. He was also well known for being a football commentator and pitchman (Boom! Tough-actin Tinactin!). But before all that, Madden was a successful young coach.
Madden was the head coach of the Oakland Raiders from 1969-78 and went 103-32-7. His teams made the playoffs eight of his 10 seasons as head coach, and he never had a losing record. He has more wins than any coach in Raiders history and the best winning percentage (.759) of any coach in the modern era.
The Raiders reached the AFC Championship Game six times under Madden, winning it in 1976 — the season they also won the Super Bowl.
What were some of Madden’s keys to success as a head coach? He had three rules, and you probably wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they are fairly simple:
1) Be on time
2) Pay attention
3) Play like hell when I tell you to
“That’s really all you need,” he said of his rules.
You can hear Madden talk about his rules at the 2:01 mark in this NFL Network video look back at Madden’s career:
That’s the thing about Madden. He may have been a genius when it came to studying film and game-planning. But one of his greatest talents was his ability to simplify things. He broke his coaching down to three easy rules, and it worked great.
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