From ballboy to winning head coach

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ThePresence

ThePresence

Elite Member
Nov 19, 2001
27,727
16
81
Craig Carton is now a local talk show guy who probably kicks himself in the head every morning for not taking this job.
Text
Life is funny sometimes.

In 1992 I was hired by a radio station then known as WWWE or 3-W-E in Cleveland. It was and still is a very powerful radio station, although the call letters have changed -- so powerful that my show, broadcast weeknights from 6 to 10, could be heard in 28 states and half of Canada, or so the marketing message said.

I was a kid still wet behind the ears and, truthfully, had kind of fallen into radio and been lucky enough to get a job first in Buffalo, then in Cleveland after their radio executives heard me and thought a brash young kid might cure their miserable ratings.

Within six months the show rocketed into the top five in the ratings, but despite the success I still had no idea what I was doing or if I really even wanted to be in radio.

At the same time I was having this career indecision, I happened to be covering the Cleveland Browns and had become friends with head coach Bill Belichick.

The Browns were putrid at that time and Belichick, still years from becoming the best coach in the game and a three-time Super Bowl winner, was under FBI protection because he benched Bernie Kosar in favor of Todd Philcox, a journeyman QB with no credentials.

The mutiny had begun.

Bill and I spoke often, at least twice a week. In one memorable press conference, when he was being grilled about his plan for Philcox in an upcoming game, he told the assembled media and ESPN to "ask Craig Carton, he's our new offensive coordinator."

Clearly, it was a joke, but it got us to talking about whether I really liked radio or if I would be interested in working for him and the Browns. The job presented to me by a Browns VP was that of ball boy, and it wasn't a job so much as an unpaid internship with the promise of future employment if I didn't screw up.

Can you screw up being a ball boy? Are there nuances of the job that I didn't know about? Did I have to throw a perfect spiral?

I thought about it long and hard and was actually leaning at one point to giving it a shot, but WIP in Philadelphia came calling and with it the chance to be in one of the country's largest media markets, at a station ready to enter its prime and take off.

Obviously, I chose radio, but I used to wonder about who got the ball boy job from Belichick and what happened to the guy who took the shot I turned down.

I got my answer this weekend. Turns out the Browns did indeed hire a ball boy in my place, and things worked out pretty well for him -- Eric Mangini, now coach of the Jets.

And that's a true story. Life.
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dbk

dbk

Lifer
Apr 23, 2004
17,685
10
81
That is really cool. Kinda similar to Lawrence Frank's story.
 
C

CTrain

Diamond Member
Sep 26, 2001
4,940
0
0
The story is cool and all but there was never a guaranty that he was going to be a successful coach but we do know that hes a successful talk show host.

Its not like missing out on buying Google stocks or something like that where you were guaranty for success.
 
ThePresence

ThePresence

Elite Member
Nov 19, 2001
27,727
16
81
Originally posted by: j00fek
id like the true story when bill and eric hate each other :p
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I saw those handshakes too, but I don't know if they HATE each other, Bill just doesn't strike me as an overly friendly guy.
 
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