Marley moving on from coaching USJ

A familiar face was at the Fellowship of Christian Athletes 7-on-7 camp this past week at Trinity Christian as former University School of Jackson head football coach Mickey Marley was on hand helping out.

“We helped get this thing started 100 years ago,” Marley said about the camp. “I’ve always been a supporter of FCA, and I wanted to be back out here supporting it if they needed my help at all.”

It turns out Marley was needed. He helped keep time on two of the fields on Wednesday. He helped administrate and figure out the schedule on Thursday after a couple hours’ delay because of the high heat index, contracted schedule and shuffling because teams had left early.

Marley accomplished a lot his way

“I thought I was just coming out to watch a clock and blow an air horn,” Marley said. “I didn’t think I’d have to help actually figure stuff out.”

This week was the first time he’d been on a football field for high school ball since last November when he led the Bruins to the Division II-A semifinals. He was dismissed from his coaching duties in December.

The decision and its obvious effect on his life – and that of his family – was something he had to get used to. He’s had opportunities to coach elsewhere, even being contacted by some programs in West Tennessee, but nothing seemed right.

“My wife, Lisa, and I … we got to a point where we accepted the decision and moved on,” Marley said. “We’re at peace with it. Didn’t like it when it happened, disagreed with it and still do to a point.

“But we’ve moved on and have transitioned to what’s next, and honestly, the peace we have about it is unexplainable. Because I thought I’d always need a football team to coach. And I still want to coach. But I’m doing OK without it for now.”

Getting used to change

Marley walked into the locker room at TCA’s fieldhouse after helping at the camp for the previous three hours in the hot sun. The air conditioning hit him with a welcomed jolt of relief from the heat warning affecting West Tennessee’s outdoors.

He was also hit with the smell of a sweaty locker room in the middle of July.

“Man I miss that smell,” Marley said with a grin. “I wish I could pipe it in to my office at home. Or my bedroom if my wife would let that happen.”

He then shook his head with a chuckle because he knew she wouldn’t.

After sitting down to talk about what his life’s been like for the past seven months since he was let go as USJ’s coach, a grin comes across his face as the corners of his mouth rise sharply looking back on the first half of 2016.

“I’ve been able to do some things I’ve never been able to do because I’ve been coaching for the past 35 years,” said Marley, referring to the last 27 years leading USJ to 245 wins and working as an assistant coach at Old Hickory Academy and UT Martin before that. “I’ve gotten to spend a lot more time with my grandkids. Do you have any idea how awesome that is?”

Marley has three grandchildren who live in Shelby County. Their ages are 9, 7 and 3. The two older ones are getting into athletics.

“Man, when baseball season was going on, we were going down there three times a week watching them play and working with them in the backyard,” Marley said. “During the summer we’ve been going twice a week working on football.

“They’ve got tackling dummies they can work with, and I’ve been showing them the right techniques when they’re going to tackle. Because if they’re going to play, they need to learn that stuff now. And that league they play in in Germantown and Collierville, that’s a good league they’re in.”

The activities with the family actually helped Marley figure out what to do with his time.

“For 35 years, it’s been football, football, football all year long,” Marley said. “Everybody thinks it slows down for us in December until spring ball, but there’s always something to be done. Something to be taken care of.

“Now I haven’t had to do all that stuff. I’ve gotten to be a granddad and a dad and a husband. And my wife said in a way, this could be the best thing that could’ve happened to me for my health.”

A chance to heal

Marley said he feels as good now as he has in a long time, and that’s significant this time of year.

“Every year since 2011, I’ve had some kind of episode or whatever you want to call it with my heart in July right about the time we’re supposed to get started,” Marley said. “And I’ve just never had enough time to heal.

“We’ve told kids who pulled muscles or broken bones or whatever to make sure you’re healed enough before you get back out there and don’t rush it. But I never followed that advice. I just got back out there.”

The two best examples of that were the most recent time USJ made it to the Division II-A state championship game in 2011 and about a year ago before the start of the 2015 season.

“In 2011, we were on the field in Cookeville playing in the state championship game in the evening, and I knew win or lose the next day I was going to be on a table in Jackson at noon getting a heart cath done,” Marley said. “I’d lost some energy that season and dealt with issues that came up earlier in the summer, but I kept coming and didn’t miss any practice or anything because I was the coach. It’s my job to be there.”

Marley had to deal with a similar issue about a year ago.

“I’d gone out to the school on a Saturday in July, and I’d gotten used to episodes where my heart rate would jump up to as high as 150 or higher,” Marley said. “And I was out there working with sleds or something by myself in the heat like a genius, and all the sudden it hit me that I knew an episode was coming on. I could feel it.”

The episode triggered a series of tests to be run in Jackson and Nashville to try to figure out what was going on over the course of a couple weeks.

During this time, Marley got a call from his brother letting him know their cousin had died from a heart attack.

“We were like brothers, and I couldn’t believe it,” Marley said. “So I’m having tests done and burying my cousin.

“And during this time, we’re scrimmaging Crockett County and having practice. I never missed a practice. I was at the school doing what the head coach is supposed to do.”

The issues lingered, robbing him of energy while doctors tried to figure out what the best form of action to take with medication to keep Marley healthy. It seemed to work toward the end of the regular season.

“There toward the end in the last few weeks, I felt my energy coming back,” Marley said. “I didn’t say anything about it because talking about it wouldn’t help or hurt. Just go and do your job.”

But Marley was looking at the prospect of going through another busy offseason without properly dealing with his health issues until the blessing in disguise of his dismissal happened on Dec. 14, 2015.

“I was able to relax and just allow my body to recuperate,” Marley said. “And I feel like it’s helped a lot. I feel as good now as I did when I was 20 years younger.”

Support from friends

Marley said the night he was fired his and his wife’s phones were constantly buzzing with text messages and calls of support and condolences over losing his job.

“We were so overwhelmed by what we got that night, continued to get in the weeks after and still get to this day from people all over the place,” Marley said. “People I wouldn’t have expected or even thought would say anything to me reached out to me. It was nice to have that during that time.”

Marley said he heard from a famous acquaintance who’d gone through his predicament seven years before.

“Phillip Fulmer called me, probably in January or so, and gave me some advice and told me some things that really affirmed what Lisa and I were thinking about the situation,” Marley said. “He told me he took time to work with his grandchildren in baseball, and he loved it and they made their all-star team.

“And he told me how it gave him a chance to recharge his batteries. Both of those were big things to let me know maybe this was something for my good. We were even the same age when he was fired from Tennessee and I was fired at 58 years old.”

Former players, players’ parents, opposing coaches, other acquaintances in college coaching and other friends reached out to him.

“When something that you think could be devastating happens, it’s good if you can have someone tell you it’s OK,” Marley said. “We knew everything would be OK one way or another, but it was good to hear that.”

Staying in football

Marley said he hopes to coach again sometime in the right situation.

He’s stayed in touch with coaches in college and the pros and has continued to try to learn more about the game and new things being tried in 2016.

“Here was my Spring Break: I spent two days at Alabama, two days in Knoxville, two days at Ole Miss and a day or two in Nashville with the Titans,” Marley said. “I talked with the coaches asking to get film in certain situations against certain opponents just so I could see what they do and how they handle certain situations.

“I might ask for an entire film on a game not to watch the game like a fan might but to break down what I could to see what that coaching staff decided to do.”

Marley said he’s got enough film to keep him busy in football for the time being.

“And I’ve got tons of film from colleges and NFL teams all over the country,” Marley said. “I spent all spring and part of the summer watching all that film then stopped and slowed down some because I’ll want something to do when the season gets here.”

So what does he plan to do with all the knowledge he’s gaining from all the film?

“I want to coach again, and I’ll want something new to do when if and when I get to coach,” Marley said. “We’re firm believers that when God is ready for a door to shut, He’ll shut it like he did at the end of last season.

“But when He’s ready for another door to open, it will open. We’re waiting to see if another door will open. If not, that’s OK too.”

The next move

Marley said his next step won’t take him very far.

“They told me I could still teach at USJ, so I’m teaching,” Marley said. “USJ is a good school with good teachers, and it’s done a lot for me and my family.

“I have no problem staying with it and holding on here until we’re called to do something else.”

Marley will continue to teach, and he still has quality relationships with everyone he works with.

He’s not bitter toward USJ about how things happened in December either.

“We’re at peace with it and have moved on,” Marley said. “Not being at peace with it and not moving on won’t change anything. Or if it does, it won’t change anything for the better, so there’s no sense in it.”

Marley said he and the coaches remaining on the staff – Jim Hardegree and Bryce King – still talk and are friends.

“There’s no reason why we wouldn’t be,” Marley said. “Those are two guys USJ football will need if they want to be successful.”

He said he appreciates USJ headmaster Stuart Hirstein and the opportunity to remain a part of the school’s faculty.

Marley said he’s still devoted to his players, and they’ve mostly expressed their devotion to him. While he has no plans at this point to attend USJ games this season, he doesn’t plan to avoid Kirkland Field forever if there’s a reason to go.

“If they had an event like they were honoring a team that went to Cookeville or something like that, and they wanted me to be there to be a part of it to help honor them, I’d have no problem being there,” Marley said. “Those guys that did that deserve to be honored, and I’d be glad to be a part of it.”

For now his Friday night plans are to possibly go watch a few games that look interesting to him as a fan, which he’s never done before. He might go watch a couple of college games on Saturday too if they fit in his schedule.

“But I know every Saturday I will be in Memphis watching my grandsons play,” Marley said.

In his football room at home, Marley said there’s a helmet on it with the signature of every player on USJ’s roster last year except one.

“I love that thing, because those were my players and I loved them,” Marley said. “And that’s what coaching truly is about.

“Winning is fun. Practice can be too. But those relationships you build while you’re doing all that is what really counts. And I saw that first hand when I heard from a ton of guys last winter. It made me feel a lot better in a time that wasn’t very good. And I thank all them for that.”

Brandon Shields, 425-9751