If I thought he had any chance to win, however, I'd vote for the man I think did the most remarkable coaching job of 1999 -- and maybe of any year since I started covering football a decade ago. A man whose team finished 8-8. And no, I'm not talking about Bill Parcells, who, in trendy NFL expert circles, supposedly "did the best coaching job of his career" in '99. Excuse me? Parcells left his team without an established backup quarterback, then, when Vinny Testaverde went down in Week 1, allowed the Jets to crumble for half a season, rallying them only after they fell out of playoff contention. Nice work.

No, the best coaching job of the season came from a man who began it with the highest winning percentage in NFL history and ended it with one of the craziest 8-8s you'll ever see: George Seifert, Carolina Panthers.

Seifert inherited a Panthers team that went 4-12 in '98 and, among other problems, was pressed against the salary cap like spandex tights on Nate Newton. That meant that instead of signing big-time free agents, they had to settle for bargains like wideout Patrick Jeffers, whom the Panthers plucked away from Dallas for $1.2 million. Ask football people around the league, and they'll tell you Carolina's roster had less pure talent than any team except Cleveland's. Seifert's quarterback, Steve Beuerlein, was regarded as a capable journeyman; his halfback, Tshimanga Biakabutuka, was viewed as a washout. Then, during the season, one of his starting receivers, Rae Carruth, was charged with attempted murder -- and you all know how quiet a story that has been in the Charlotte area. If ever a team had a potential to be distracted by a grisly, off-the-field situation, this was it. And yet through all of the horrific speculation, with all of the Panthers' shortcomings, Seifert kept them in contention for a playoff berth through the final game of the season.

Because Seifert was one of the great defensive coordinators of his era before becoming the 49ers' head coach in 1989 -- and because the Niners' offensive coordinators during his tenure included two brilliant strategists, Mike Holmgren and Mike Shanahan -- people tend to view him as someone who can't tell a screen pass from a striped bass. But when I asked Wesley Walls, Carolina's talented tight end, to explain the team's offensive explosion (Beuerlein turning into a prolific, Pro Bowl quarterback; Biakabutuka, when healthy, becoming the breakaway threat the Panthers always hoped he could be; Jeffers, out of nowhere, emerging as a star-in-waiting), the first two words out of his mouth were, "George Seifert."

Here's Walls's take: "George has seen this West Coast Offense for so long, and has coached against it on so many levels, that he has a pretty good vision of what it's supposed to look like. He'd come to our offensive meetings and sort of bring the perspective of how defenses will cover certain formations, and how we might be able to attack those defenses. The result, I think, is that it's opened up our offense. I'd bet a gold mine that we've had more big plays this year than we had in my first four seasons here combined."

As a motivator, Seifert worked wonders with a team that had blown a bunch of leads and lost an NFL-record-tying nine games by a touchdown or less in '98. When he saw the pattern repeat -- Carolina went up 21-0 on Washington before losing in Week 4 -- he knew he had to work on the team's killer instinct. When the Panthers flew to his old stomping grounds, San Francisco, for their next game, Seifert found a dramatic means of hammering home his point.

"They showed Saving Private Ryan on the plane," Walls recalls, "and later that day, when we went to Candlestick and walked through, he brought it up when we were in the locker room. He said, 'Something in that movie upset me. What was one of the biggest mistakes the American soldiers made?' Someone yelled out, 'They didn't kill the German, and later he came back and killed Tom Hanks.' George said, 'That's right. Now, I don't want to compare that war to what we're doing, because the implications were so much larger, but that's exactly what this team needs to do. We need to finish people off when we have the chance, because otherwise they'll come back to kill us.' The next day, we went out and got a lead on the 49ers, and we all thought about that speech as we put them away."

I met Seifert at 49ers headquarters in 1989, when I was a rookie beat writer for a now-defunct rag of a paper in Sacramento and he was a rookie head coach. I've seen him grow in so many ways, primarily in his ability and willingness to convey his wit and personality to those around him. Beyond the obvious strategic aptitude and work ethic, it's hard to quantify what makes him such a successful coach. For me, two things stand out: When his teams don't win, they're almost always in the game, a sign that he is both well-prepared and adaptable. Secondly, he's willing to sublimate his ego for the good of the team, and this carries over -- anyone is considered replaceable, and he imparts a sort of tunnel vision in his players that allows them to care only about winning.

This, I believe, is why the Panthers were able to plow through the Carruth drama and stay in the playoff hunt, even though they had no business being anywhere near .500.

"No one can really put together one or two sentences to explain how George motivates you," says Walls, who played for Seifert in San Francisco from 1989-93. "It's a bunch of things -- a little comment here, a little observation there, maybe a few words to you personally -- that happen all throughout the week. It's like he's a counselor or something. "You're getting therapy from George Seifert -- now that's a scary thought. He pulled out analogies all year long, and a lot of it was stuff I heard every year in San Francisco. But still, they worked. He's got a great way of not making you think you're getting a pep talk, but of making you understand the seriousness of the moment."

I'll leave you with a not-so-bold prediction. Wait until Seifert, a man who doesn't really care about individual glory, gets some players. Then watch him win Super Bowl No. 3.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Michael Silver wields The Silver Sword every Friday on CNNSI.com. To goad him into responding to an e-mail or two, click here.

The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.

 

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