Rams coaching search: Hall of Famer Ron Wolf explains how experience on both sides of the ball is important

What should the Rams keep in mind when hiring their next coach? NFL legends Tony Dungy, Ron Wolf, and Jimmy Johnson weigh in with their first-person perspective in this three-part series on finding a coach who best fits a franchise. Today: Ron Wolf. Monday: Jimmy Johnson. Here’s Saturday’s: Tony Dungy.

Today, Ron Wolf. a Hall of Fame personnel executive, Wolf was integral in building the Oakland and then Los Angeles Raiders from the mid-1960s through the 1980s (with some intermittent breaks), then served as the Green Bay Packers’ general manager from 1991 to 2001. In between he was briefly general manager of the expansion Tampa Bay Buccaneers, where he laid the foundation that would help them reach the NFC championship game in their fourth year of existence.

Among his many accomplishments, he hired Mike Holmgren as coach of the Packers and traded a first-round pick to Atlanta for a player who at the time had some health and character concerns, a young quarterback named Brett Favre.

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When you’re hiring a coach, too much emphasis is put on whether you’re looking for an offensive guy or a defensive guy. If a coach is good, he’s good no matter which side of the ball he comes from. Just look at Bill Belichick. Before the Patriots hired him, everybody was saying they needed an offensive guy. Well, he’s a defensive guy, and he’s been a dominant force for a long time, and he’s had the best team in the league for a long time.

The first thing you have to establish is: Who’s in charge? That’s very important. Is it going to be a joint venture where it’s the GM and the head coach, or is the head coach going to lead everything? If you’re really good, you’re probably going to want to run your own show as a head coach.

So much of hiring a coach depends on who’s doing the interviewing. I come from a belief that you have to have a football guy making those decisions. I don’t think you can overemphasize the importance of that.

I don’t think you can hire someone as an NFL head coach who only has college experience. The NFL is a different game. Pete Carroll is someone who came from the college ranks, but he had a lot of NFL experience before he was at USC. I worked with him for two years with the New York Jets, when I was their personnel director and he was their defensive coordinator. He’s an example of someone who knows both worlds.

There’s obviously a guy at the University of Michigan who could coach in either college football or the NFL, but you’d have to spend an awful lot of money to get Jim Harbaugh, even if you could.

You want a dominant individual as a head coach. When I was at Green Bay, Mike Holmgren was the “girl with the curl.” There were a lot of people who wanted him. He had a real strength to him. The San Francisco 49ers went 10-5-1 and made the playoffs in his first year as quarterbacks coach, even though they had to mostly use Jeff Kemp and Mike Moroski because Joe Montana was hurt.

Right away, you knew that Mike had an ability and a talent. Then he comes in and I interview him, and you could see why he was successful. He liked and had a real knowledge of the history of the game.

You’d be surprised by how many people come in for interviews without doing their homework. There are so many people that come in and eliminate themselves just from their lack of preparedness.

If somebody wants that job, they had better know your team. Guys will just give you what their pro scouts give them about your players. You’ll say, “How are you going to handle this situation?” and they’ll say, “Well, I’ll coach ‘em up.”

You’ll coach ‘em up? I don’t want to hear that. I want to hear how you’re going to take a team and mold it, how you’re going to make it work.

You’re given a tremendous responsibility here. You’re talking about a billion-dollar industry, and you’re the focal point of it. You want to be paid like an executive of a prime corporation, you’d better be one.

This is very important: You want to know who a guy is going to bring in to be on his staff. There are certain positions that are so doggone important. So you listen, and you can tell whether a guy is prepared or not.

You’ve got to have a good offensive line coach. If you’re an offensive guy, you’d better get somebody solid to coordinate your defense. Special teams coaches are so important. Then, you’d better have somebody that understands coverages.

Mike had a sense of preparation to him. He knew how they were going to run every day, what they were going to do. Every day was laid out. Plus, he had the success that went with being with the 49ers. He had that air about him. He could come in and take charge. He was a winner.