Atlanta Falcons Court UCLA’s Terry Donahue : Team Executives Fly to L.A., Apparently With a Lucrative Contract Offer

Rankin Smith Jr., president of the Atlanta Falcons, and his brother Taylor, the NFL team’s executive vice president, flew to Los Angeles on the family’s private jet Tuesday and apparently met with UCLA Coach Terry Donahue to talk to him about becoming the Falcons’ coach.

The Falcons, who have been without a coach since Dan Henning was fired Dec. 22, are prepared to offer Donahue a contract package worth $750,000 a season, and total control of the football operation, according to a source in Atlanta. However, a National Football League source said that the Falcons had offered Donahue a five-year, $5-million deal.

UCLA Athletic Director Peter T. Dalis gave the Falcons permission to talk with Donahue, whose contract with the university is estimated at between $200,000 and $250,000 annually.

“There’s no way that UCLA could ever match an NFL coach’s contract,” Dalis said. “They’re in business. We’re in education.”

Donahue’s contract at UCLA is unique in that it remains at five years by automatically rolling over each year.

Dalis said that the Falcons are the first NFL team to have requested permission from him to talk with Donahue, although Donahue’s name had been mentioned speculatively at Kansas City before the Chiefs hired the recently fired John Mackovic and briefly at San Diego when Don Coryell resigned.

Both Notre Dame and Arizona State asked for and received permission to talk to Donahue when they were looking for coaches, Dalis said.

Donahue could not be reached for comment Tuesday. His plans were to go on a recruiting trip, Dalis said, but then Donahue said he had become ill.

The Falcons began to show interest in Donahue at the urging of Dick Vermeil, former UCLA and Philadelphia Eagles’ coach, according to sources.

Four days after Henning’s firing, Vermeil turned down an offer to coach the Falcons, who were apparently offering Vermeil a salary equivalent to the highest-paid NFL coach, Don Shula. The Miami Dolphins recently signed Shula to a new contract worth approximately $1 million.

In addition, Vermeil reportedly would have had total control of the football operation and assumed a percentage of the team, possibly as much as 5%. The worth of the Falcon franchise has been estimated at $60 million.

Vermeil was coach of the 1974 and 1975 Bruin teams, and Donahue was an assistant on his staff. According to one of the sources, Vermeil and Donahue have discussed the Falcon job in recent days.

Besides the money involved, there seem to be several benefits for Donahue if he joins the Falcons and works for the Smiths, headed by principal owner Rankin Smith Sr., father of Rankin Jr. and Taylor. The senior Smith has largely given control of the team to his sons in recent years.

Donahue would be employed by a family that has a reputation for keeping its hands off the team. He would inherit assistant coach Marion Campbell, regarded as one of the NFL’s top defensive coordinators.

Donahue would also be coaching a team with one of the most modern and expensive practice facilities in the NFL.

Dalis said he expects teams to be interested in Donahue and is not surprised that the Falcons are courting him now.

“They’re serious,” Dalis said. “They’re running out of people.

“Terry is a highly regarded football coach. If you’ve got any brains, you realize Terry Donahue is good at what he does.”

Donahue, 42, finished his 11th season at UCLA with an 8-3-1 record. He is the winningest coach in school history with an 87-34-7 mark.

The Falcons have had seven coaches in 21 years. Henning lasted four years and was fired with a 22-41-1 mark.

Atlanta was 7-8-1 last season under Henning, which represented the seventh-best record in the NFC and put the Falcons into third place in the NFC West.