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By Joey Seymour
 SAN DIEGO—It is a bit ironic that the man who proposed the idea for the Super Bowl, Sid Gillman, never won that championship for himself. Yet, twelve coaches who were (or are) direct disciples of Gillman have won a combined twenty Lombardi trophies. Such is the legacy that Sid Gillman left on the National Football League. He was a successful coach and advisor for over six decades. Beyond being the revolutionary father of the modern passing game, Gillman was a passionate teacher whose lessons continue to bring success to those who were fortunate enough to learn from him.
Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota on October 26, 1911, Sidney Gillman developed his interest for the game of football while working for his father as a movie usher. He would watch the Fox Movietone newsreels with intrigue as they showed highlights of football games. Afterwards, he would ask the projectionist to cut out the clips and then he’d slice them together, in an effort to study all the elements of the game.
Gillman played football at the Ohio State University where he went on to become a team captain. He played one year as a professional for the Cleveland Rams (1936), but found his calling for coaching when he was asked to become an assistant for his alma mater. He was an assistant coach from 1934 – 1943, first for the Buckeyes of Ohio State, then with Denison University, and finally with the University of Miami, Ohio where he became head coach in 1944.
After a short stint as an assistant at West Point (his handpicked successor was Vince Lombardi), Gillman began to develop his unique and original coaching style as the head coach of the University of Cincinnati (1949 – 1954) when he blended his passion for film with coaching. Gillman began filming his games and studying them afterwards for ways to improve. Esther Gillman, whom Sid had married in 1935, was quoted as saying, “during our honeymoon in 1935, Sid bought a projector for $15 at a pawn shop. He was only going to make $1,800 that year (as an assistant coach for the Buckeyes), and we couldn’t afford it. I thought I would kill him.”
The utilization of the game film not only gave Gillman a distinct advantage on the field, but he used the movies to entertain the UC students off the gridiron as well. Every week in the Tangeman University Center, Gillman would play the previous weekend's game. Hundreds upon hundreds of students reportedly would attend the viewings, making the coach very popular with the student body.
Sid Gillman coached at the University level for ten years and amassed an impressive record of 81-19-2.
In 1955, the National Football League came calling when the Los Angeles Rams were looking for a head coach. Gillman got the job and began to develop the schemes that became part of his much praised and highly successful passing game. The Rams competed in the NFL championship in 1955, losing to the Cleveland Browns, and after a 2-10 season in 1959, Gillman left the NFL for the newly formed American Football League. He became head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers in 1960.
Gillman’s years with the Chargers are well documented: He led the team to five western division titles and the team’s only championship in 1963. His techniques for timed passing and attacking the defense with a spread offense caused other coaches to quickly adapt their archaic schemes. As the head coach of the Chargers, Gillman’s record was 87-57-6. He remains the Chargers coach with the most wins and highest winning percentage. It may be some time before his records are broken.
Beyond being the Chargers coach, he was actually their General Manager as well. It was in this role that Gillman tested the social waters by openly recruiting African Americans. Chargers All-Pro offensive lineman, Ron Mix told The Jewish Journal in 2003, “In the early ‘60s, when the civil rights movement was in its infancy, and some professional football teams appeared to have a quota on the number of black players allowed, Sid had open competition and initiated social integration on the team: he assigned training camp roommates by position so that there would be a natural reason for blacks and whites to room together.”
His color blind attitude and progressive plays were instrumental to the Chargers success and were the elements that set Gillman apart, but that also kept him in demand. In 1971, Gillman and Chargers owner George Klein reached an impasse regarding the team’s direction and Gillman was fired.
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He was quickly snatched up by the Dallas Cowboys and head coach Tom Landry to serve as their quality-control coach. In 1973 he was hired as General Manager of the Houston Oilers and ended up taking over the coaching reins five games into the season. In 1974 he was named AFC Coach of the Year, but was fired the next season by Oilers owner Bud Adams.
Sid and Esther moved to Carlsbad and Gillman was resolved to the fact that his football days were behind him. Then in 1977 the Chicago Bears were looking for an offensive coordinator and the 65 year-old Gillman eagerly took the job. The Bears made the playoffs for the first time in fourteen seasons. Yet, Gillman was let go after only one season with the Bears. He had a brief stint back at the University level for United States International University’s San Diego campus. He put the team together in a month, but left prior to the season beginning, when the Philadelphia Eagles called upon his services to improve their dismal offense. From 1978 to the Eagles Super Bowl season of 1980, Gillman remained on board. After the 1980 season, he returned once again to Carlsbad to retire quietly with his family.
Gillman told Sports Illustrated in 1991 (the same year he was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame), “Once you’ve got football in your blood, you can’t get away from it.” He certainly could not.
When the United States Football League was formed, Gillman became the General Manager of the Oklahoma Outlaws (1983-84) and then served as special advisor for the Los Angeles Express in 1985. However, the league folded that year, but Gillman was not out of work for long. The Eagles asked him to return as their Quarterbacks coach in 1985. That would be his final season as a football coach.
In 1986, Sid Gillman finally walked away from the side lines, but he could not walk away from the game entirely. In his La Costa home, he had a film room where he would review tapes that teams around the NFL sent him, seeking his advice. He told Paul Zimmerman of Sports Illustrated, “What else would I be doing? It’s my life, what keeps me going.”
He kept going until the morning of January 3, 2003, when at the age of 91, Sid Gillman passed away in his sleep leaving behind his wife of sixty-eight years, Esther, four children, eight grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.
To Ron Mix, Gillman was more than a coach; “I had been born in Boyle Heights, at the time an East Los Angeles Russian Jewish ghetto. When I learned about Sid, I was short of a father figure and short on identity. Then, I read that a Jew had been named the head coach of the team I had loved for years (Rams)…what a revelation it was for me: Jews were All-American football players and leaders of the Los Angeles Rams. My world had begun an expansion that continues to this day.”
Sid Gillman broke down racial and religious barriers while constructing innovative and game changing techniques. He is a patriarch of the country’s most popular sport and even though he never held aloft the trophy named for one his students, Vince Lombardi, Gillman’s place in sports history is forever cemented, and all San Diegans should be proud that he was our coach.
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