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Super comeback Vermeil more relaxed than in last Super Bowl appearance
Posted: Sunday January 30, 2000 01:57 PM
Sports Illustrated NFL writer Peter King sat down and went one-on-one with Rams coach Dick Vermeil: Peter King: You are such a different person than the tightly-wound guy who lead the Philadelphia Eagles to Super Bowl XXIII early in the Reagan administration. In fact, this week you said that you wanted to relax and have fun. Dick Vermeil using the words "relax" and "have fun" in the same sentence, what's wrong with that picture? Dick Vermeil: I have purposefully tried to stay a little lower key because I don't want the players to be too excited too soon or too uptight. I figured if I was, as the leader, a little more relaxed and little more poised and a little more understanding to the things that would normally make you mad, then we might be a little better prepared to play Sunday evening. King: How do you like your chances in this game? Vermeil: I like our chances very much. I really think we are a better team than they are, but that doesn't mean we are going to win. I think overall we have enough people to beat them and overall they have enough people to beat us, but we plan on winning. King: What is your single biggest concern entering the game? Vermeil: We just can't turn the ball over. Jeff Fisher and his staff have done a tremendous job. They finished the regular season plus-16 in turnover ratio; that's hard to do. If we can play smart and keep the game physical, then I think we have a much better chance of winning. King: What will you say to your team Vermeil: You know, I have been speaking with these guys and talking to them and communicating with them all year. There is not much left to say. I'll just more or less thank them for taking me along for the ride and ask them to have some fun. Win, lose or draw, they're the same people. All year long we've prepared to win this thing and behind closed doors we have talked about this. So I don't think they'll be totally surprised and I think they expect to win. King: If you win the game, will you retire? Vermeil: I don't think so. My basic thought is to honor my contract. If all of a sudden my wife Carol and I sit down and say we've done all that we can do -- we have 11 grandkids -- let's go home to the ranch and it sounds like the right thing to do for all the right reasons, I'd do it. But right now, that doesn't sound like the right thing to do. King: If you're wondering why Dick Vermeil wouldn't want to go out on top at the age of 63, well, it's easy. He was nearly fired about 500 times in the last two years when the Rams were failing. Now he wants to enjoy it. I don't think he is going to hand the job to his successor, Mike Martz, until at least 2001.
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