Rich Kotite

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Richard Edward "Rich" Kotite (born October 13, 1942) is a former National Football League player and coach.

Playing career

Kotite was born in Brooklyn, New York. He was a tight end who played collegiately at Wagner College on Staten Island. Kotite was drafted in the 18th round of the 1965 NFL Draft by the Minnesota Vikings. After playing for his hometown New York Giants in 1967, Kotite saw action for the Pittsburgh Steelers the next year before returning to the Giants for a four-year stint beginning in 1969.

Coaching career

Following the end of his playing career, Kotite spent much of the next two decades serving as an assistant coach in the NFL.

Philadelphia Eagles

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Kotite was offensive coordinator of the Philadelphia Eagles during the 1990 season. After Head Coach Buddy Ryan was fired, Kotite was elevated to replace him.

During his first two years, Kotite led the squad to a 10 and 11 win seasons in 1991 and 1992 respectively. His 1991 defense, coached by Bud Carson, led the league in total defense, run defense, and pass defense. In 1992, the Eagles finished 8-0 at home and earned a Wildcard berth; they defeated the Saints 36-20. In 1994, the Eagles began the year with a 7-2 mark; Kotite told the media that he was going to investigate his options following rumors that new team owner Jeffrey Lurie was not going to renew his contract. The timing proved disastrous, with the Eagles losing all seven of their remaining games.

The beginning of the end of the Eagles' slide happened after a botched two-point conversion attempt. In a rain-soaked contest at Texas Stadium, the Eagles scored a touchdown with 5:27 left against their hated division rivals, the Dallas Cowboys, cutting their deficit to 11 at 24-13. Against objections from his staff, Kotite went for a two-point conversion, and Eagles' quarterback Randall Cunningham was stopped short of the end zone. Afterwards, Kotite blamed the error on the weather. "It was raining very heavily at the time," he explained. "And we looked at the chart and misread the chart." Kotite had a chart suggesting when an extra point should be kicked and when a two-pointer should be attempted, but since there was no protective sheet on top of it, the ink ran in the rain. Kotite was heavily criticized for failing to recognize that, chart or no chart, the risks of a two-point conversion attempt in that situation far outweigh the benefits.

Yet another memorable event of Kotites' tenure became known as the "decline the penalty and punt" incident. Against the Falcons and on a third-and-15 play from the Philadelphia 35, Randall Cunningham threw a 14-yard pass to receiver Calvin Williams but the Falcons were offside. The Eagles had a choice to make: They could take the penalty and have a third and 10 at the 40 or they could take the play and have a fourth and 1 at the 49. Eagles called timeout as Kotite pondered his choices. He decided to decline the penalty. Common logic would then dictate the Eagles would go for the 4th and 1 versus a 3 and 10 situation. But to everyones surprise, he sent in the punting unit. All traces of reason and logic were disregarded, as instead of being given another third down opportunity he chose to punt the ball away! This "decline the penalty and punt" debacle was just another blunder to add to his ever growing resume of poor coaching decisions. Atlanta scored on the next possession to go up by 2 TDs and went on to win the game easily.^[1]

New York Jets

After his dismissal by the Eagles, Kotite returned to the New York area where he was hired as head coach of the New York Jets, who had just fired Pete Carroll after one season and a 6-10 record. At the press conference to announce the hiring, team owner Leon Hess explained the choice by saying, "I'm 80 years old. I want results now!" Hess was to be disappointed as Kotite mustered only 4 wins over two seasons, 3-13 and 1-15. In both of his seasons as head coach, the Jets had the dubious honor of owning the worst record in the NFL. Despite these losses, Kotite remained upbeat during his postgame press conferences, often praising his defense as "swarming." Two days prior to his last game as Jets coach in 1996, Kotite announced he was stepping down as head coach and has since never returned to the NFL sidelines in any coaching capacity.

Counting his last seven games with the Eagles, Kotite lost 35 of his final 39 games as an NFL head coach, for a winning percentage of .103. Before that, his percentage had been .632.

Post NFL

In his post-coaching career, Kotite has been seen in a promotional commercial for USA Network's coverage of the US Open Tennis championships, and in an AmeriTrade commercial that aired during the Super Bowl XXXIV pre-game show. The latter advertisement casts him a father of a son who surprises his dad by saying that he wants to be a Broadway dancer.

References