Bring It To Jerome

While fans don’t always acknowledge his genius, in football circles Wade Phillips is recognized as an all-time great defensive mind. In this episode, Phillips, who is writing a book about the 3-4 defense, talks about some of his favorite wins and shares details about his coaching philosophy. He cites a mental barrier that keeps players from playing as hard and fast as they possibly can, and how he works to move them past that. Phillips, who held the tackles record at the University of Houston for 40 years despite not being physically gifted, believes his defenses play harder than others and it comes from all-out effort, which he says is a skill: “Great effort can be taught.” And Phillips doesn’t applaud players for every type of hustle. “We grade off on players that speed up during a play,” Phillips said. “If you’re going and then all of a sudden you speed up, then you weren’t going hard enough in the first place.” Phillips always goes hard, and he does so here. Listen to one of the best ever talk football.