Money Isn’t All That Matters When a Coach Decides to Call It a Career

Greg Henry had aimed his entire career toward coaching. As a 13-year-old at McGaugh Junior High School in Seal Beach, he made up his mind to become a coach.

But after 11 years of coaching, Henry became disenchanted. He was frustrated by what he called a lack of support from his administration at Huntington Beach High School, where he was varsity football coach.

Finally, Henry applied for a position with the Long Beach Fire Department and was subsequently hired in October of 1983. With no regrets, he left behind 11 years of coaching and seven years of teaching.

“It took me six years to earn a degree to become a teacher,” Henry said. “I got a job with the fire department that requires basically a high school diploma.

“I took a slight cut in starting pay with the fire department, and then in six months I was making more money than I did as a teacher with seven years of experience. Teachers aren’t paid anything what they should be.”

Henry, 36, is now a paramedic firefighter, earning $55,000 per year. He has flexible hours that allow him to spend more time with his family than he ever did when he was coaching.

Henry is not the only Orange County coach who, for a variety of reasons, felt his job conditions left no option other than a new career.

Mike Williams taught and coached for eight years at Corona del Mar, Fountain Valley, Ocean View and Troy high schools. He was the varsity basketball coach at Troy when he left coaching in 1986.

“I wanted to be rewarded monetarily for what I thought I was worth,” he said. “I thought I was grossly underpaid as a teacher and a coach.”

Williams, 33, is now a project sales manager for Akins Development Co. in Rancho Santa Margarita. His working hours are shorter, but he is making three times what he earned as a teacher and a coach.

But money isn’t the only factor driving coaches away. The frustrations of dealing with school administrators, while trying to balance family needs against coaching responsibilities, can even wear on a veteran.

Dave Thompson was one of the county’s most successful football coaches at Marina High School, with a 58-32 record in eight seasons. Thompson took the football program--which had only one winning season before his arrival in 1978--from mediocrity to prominence.

But Thompson abruptly resigned in 1986, citing lack of administrative support in retaining full-time positions for his assistants. He is now the school’s activities director.

“There were some things that were out of my control that I thought affected my ability to coach, and that really bothered me,” he said. “I haven’t given up hope to coach again, but I have no immediate plans to get back into coaching.”

Henry also had difficulties with the administration at Huntington Beach. He said he fought to keep staff assistants from being laid off, and he fought to receive financial aid to improve his weight room.

“The hierarchy knows how much a team means to a coach, and they often use that against you,” Henry said. “I would receive a layoff notice, and the principal would ask, ‘Are you still willing to stick it out for spring football, or should we start looking for a replacement?’

“They play this heavy game against you. They know you have a deep commitment to your kids and your program on one hand, but you’re also looking for security for your family on the other hand. It wasn’t a good situation.”

Providing family security can be hard enough on a coach, but finding time can be even more difficult.

Some coaches never realize the constraints on their schedule until they stop coaching.

Henry, now 36, made a big impact in only two seasons at Huntington Beach in 1981-82. He took a team that once had the county’s longest winless streak (25 games from 1977-80) and led it to its first playoff appearance in 16 years in 1982. But his success couldn’t compensate for the time away from home.

“Don’t get me wrong. I loved it when I was coaching,” Henry said. “But I never realized how much time I spent coaching until I got out. All those hours after school and with booster meetings. The long weekends.

“I’d get home and the phone would start ringing with reporters or players or parents. I spent more time working on a game plan in my den. Coaching came first and then my family.”

The problems aside, not all coaches who have left their jobs discount the possibility of coaching again someday.

“I really miss the coaching,” Thompson said. “The pinnacle was Friday nights. You planned and worked all week and then were able to see the fruits of your labor. I miss the day-to-day association with the athletes.

“I miss seeing a young man improve. I miss seeing 40 or 50 players pull together to improve as a team during the course of a season. There weren’t many things I didn’t like about coaching.”

Martin Luczaj is one successful coach who quit and then discovered that he missed coaching so much, he got back into it.

Luczaj compiled a 52-19 record as the Fullerton High School football coach from 1981-1986, and his teams appeared in two Central Conference championship games. But he quit after the ’86 season, frustrated in part because he had to work with walk-on assistants, many of whom would leave at season’s end.

“I didn’t have coaches on staff. I not only wound up coaching the kids, but I wound up coaching coaches every year,” he said.

After he resigned his football post, Luczaj tried selling homes in Mission Viejo, but that didn’t last too long. “It was good money, but I missed coaching,” he said.

Luczaj became baseball coach at Fullerton this season and guided the Indians to an 18-7 overall record, an 11-4 Freeway League record and the league co-championship.

“I realized I missed the competition, the excitement of the games,” he said. “Football is a seven-day-a-week job; baseball is six days a week. It’s definitely a full-time deal for little or no pay.

“But working with kids is a real positive, and if you’re successful, it makes up for the low pay and long hours.”

Luczaj said he is looking to get back into coaching football.

“It would have to be the right situation,” he said. “I’m not going to dive into something that’s a losing proposition. It would have to be a situation where I could hire assistants.”