Mike Sherman drives to the office every morning along a street that bears Mike Holmgren’s name. He works inside a building that features picture after picture of Holmgren celebrating a victory in Super Bowl XXXI.
As if there weren’t enough concrete memories of the former Packers head coach all around Green Bay, Sherman was reminded again recently of the massive shadow that still looms in the blue-collar Wisconsin town.
Sherman, the Packers’ head coach since 2000, stopped for a refreshment at a neighborhood lemonade stand when a boy seemed to recognize him.
”Hey, that was the coach of the Packers,” Sherman recalls the kid telling a friend as the coach walked away. ”That was Mike Holmgren.”
Despite 35 wins in his first 52 games as a head coach, Sherman is still finding it difficult to step out of his former boss’s shadow and make a name for himself.
”When you drive to work down Mike Holmgren Way, it’s a pretty big shadow,”” Sherman said during a Wednesday conference call. ”As much as I’ve tried to change the name of that sign to Sherman Way, it’s still Mike Holmgren Way.”
While Holmgren continues to have the more impressive legacy in Green Bay, Sherman does have bragging rights in one regard. In 2001, one year after going from Seattle Seahawks offensive coordinator to head coach of the Packers, Sherman was handed the coveted title of general manager.
The irony there is that Holmgren left Green Bay because he wanted to hold dual duties as coach and general manager. While the resignation of GM Ron Wolf opened the door for Sherman, Holmgren was recently stripped of his general manager title after four largely unproductive seasons in Seattle.
”I’d be less than honest if I said I didn’t think about that,” Holmgren said in a conference call with Green Bay media Wednesday. ”I had no inkling that Ron might leave in a couple of years, and that didn’t enter into my thinking at all. When it happened, I was surprised, not that Mike got the job but that Ron left. But I was already in my new place, and I’m very happy for Mike Sherman.”
Holmgren and Sherman have remained good friends, although their relationship has been put on hold this week. Sunday marks the first time the two will square off as head coaches when the Packers host Seattle at Lambeau Field.
Playing against a former assistant is nothing new to Holmgren, who has an 8-8 record against people who used to work for him. But Sunday’s game will mark the first time he’ll face off against one of his former Seahawks assistants, while the venue will make the spotlight that much brighter.
”When you know someone pretty well,” Holmgren said, ”you always want to go back and play well.
When Sherman took over as Green Bay’s head coach more than three years ago, he came with high expectations despite never having been a head coach in college or the NFL. The Wisconsin media was quick to anoint him the next Mike Holmgren, even though the former offensive coordinator didn’t have nearly the charisma or track record.
But players quickly took a liking to Sherman, who went 9-7 in his initial year, followed by back-to-back 12-4 seasons and playoff appearances.
”Both are successful in the way that they have done things,” said Packers quarterback Brett Favre, who played for both coaches in Green Bay. ”The only difference is that Mike Holmgren has won a Super Bowl and Mike Sherman hasn’t. But I think it’s just a matter of time before Mike Sherman wins one.”
Since making the successful transition from offensive coordinator to head coach to GM/coach, the 48-year-old Sherman is slowly winning over more believers.
Even in the place where at least one former coach still maintains a Paul Bunyan-like legacy.
”He’s won a lot of games there, and he’s got a good football team,” Holmgren said of Sherman. ”He doesn’t have to prove anything to anybody.”
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