College football coaches going to the NFL

This is worth discussion in the light of Saban/Petrino ...

We know the NFL books are littered with the failed college-to-pro guys (Holtz, Spurrier, Kush, Saban, etc.) ...

But who has really succeeded?

I did a cursory look and here are the only three guys who I think are known as much/more for college coaching who have actually made a Super Bowl:

Jimmy Johnson, Barry Switzer (with a long layoff from OU) and Bobby Ross.

Others who actually succeeded? Does Tom Coughlin count?

 

Don Coryell jumps to mind.

Edit: Dick Vermeil too. He was at UCLA before the Eagles.

 

Since I've been following football seriously, the thinking has been that the NFL and College are different games. I think this has been borne out by the lack of success the aforementioned coaches have had.

Anyone else think that Johnson, and then because of Johnson, Switzer were able to succeed because of the way Johnson worked over the Vikings in the Herschel Walker trade? It seemed to me the Cowboys came out so far ahead in that deal it set up his coaching career. He had success at Miami in a second stint, but in no way close to what he acheived with the Cowboys.

 

GBHack, I think it speaks a great deal that nobody in the free-agency, salary cap era has pulled it off. Dallas could afford to spend on a ton of great players in the Johnson/Switzer era.

 

DOH, Johnson came in at the tail end of the Plan B era. Drafting still was a big deal, then. If you wanted anyone very good in the free agent market, you gave up five draft picks.

Switzer was a success in the NFL? With Jimmay's players, he was.

 

Cowboys aren't exactly going to give up that Lombardi Trophy anytime soon. Successful enough one season.

 

I seem to recall they won that Super Bowl mostly because Neil O'Donnell handed it to them on a platter.

 

That, and the Cowboys jumped out early when the Steelers played scared. Just saying that Switzer was successful enough for his team and owner's liking for one season, nothing more.

 

That was what I was implying in my original post. Barry had a stocked cupboard when he got there, thanks to a great extent to the Walker deal. The lack of a salary cap was also helpful, as it was to Bill Walsh [Stanford] when he coached the 49ers.

 

Switzer's teams did deal with the cap, although the way Jerry backloaded the deals, it barely existed.
Bill Walsh's teams were built in an era of little player movement and no salary cap.
Apples and pomegranates, methinks.

 

Sure, but the initial Post was about College coaches who had success in the NFL. I didn't think Walsh had been brought up yet.

 

Walsh also came into the NFL in a different era.
Chuck Fairbanks and others also had some success leaping from the college ranks to the NFL in the 1970s.