Jeff Saturday, the underdog who always prevailed: 'He'll shock people as Colts coach'

INDIANAPOLIS -- Coach Mack Brown is in his office at the University of North Carolina and he is shaking his head, chuckling almost, at the naysayers -- the ones ripping Jim Irsay apart, slinging mud at the Indianapolis Colts and, in turn, bashing the greatest college football center he ever coached.

If only those people knew Jeff Saturday like he knows Jeff Saturday.

Mack saw them on social media, the naysayers. He watched them on sportscasts. He listened to them poke fun and preach on the "ridiculousness" of Saturday being named the interim head coach of the Colts.

These people must not know the underdog that he knows, Brown thought, the Shamrock High School center who was told he was too small, who wasn't highly recruited as a preps player in Georgia -- and who went on to put 290 pounds on his 6-2 frame and become the best center in UNC history.

Jeff Saturday: Jeff Saturday: From pumping gas to the Colts Ring of Honor

"He’s a guy that has always embraced being told, 'No,' being told he can't do it," said Brown, who coached Saturday at UNC from 1994-1997. "So he can go prove people wrong."

The naysayers must not know that. They must not know that after Saturday led UNC to one of its best four-year runs of football, finishing 11-1 his senior season, he went undrafted in the NFL. The league sent a message to Saturday: It was a resounding no. Scouts told him he was too slow, his arms were too short, that he just wasn't pro football material.

Saturday went back to his job at the Eastgate BP in Chapel Hill where he pumped gas, plugged tires and cleaned toilets in the summers. He sat on a bench and cried.

"And then he proved them wrong," said Brown. He proved the naysayers wrong.

Saturday was signed by the Baltimore Ravens as a free agent in 1998 and cut without playing a game. But then he landed with the Colts after Bill Polian was convinced by Saturday's college teammate that he was a brute. Nate Hobgood-Chittick was on the Colts' 1998 roster, not really playing much, but he thought Saturday should be.

He "did nothing but whip a bunch of first-rounders every day in practice," Hobgood-Chittick told Polian, according to a 2015 IndyStar article. The next season, in 1999, Saturday was whipping those first-rounders for the Colts.

Saturday played for the team 13 years (with a final season in Green Bay), finishing as one of the best centers in franchise history. He won a Super Bowl, was named to four All-Pro teams, five Pro Bowls and sent to the Colts Ring of Honor.

Say it again. Say that Saturday doesn't have the experience to be coaching at the NFL level. He knows that. Tell him that all he has is a three-season stint as a high school coach at Hebron Christian Academy in Georgia. He knows that. Tell him he has no idea what it really takes to lead a team of elite athletes, men, who may have their doubts about Saturday, too.

He knows that people, players, everyone, may be betting against him. "He reminds me of a quote I use often," Brown said. "Success is the best revenge."

And if Brown were a betting man, he would put all his chips on Saturday. That he will take his post as Colts coach, as once again the undeniable underdog, and he will prevail.

"I think he will shock people," Brown said.

He knows what he doesn't know

As Saturday went solo in a press conference Wednesday at the Colts complex after talking to the players, standing in front of them in the locker room, he made it clear. He knows what he doesn't know. Like underdogs who rise to greatness often do.

"I told them this morning I don’t pretend to be the smartest guy in the room," Saturday said. "My job here is to support that staff to make our players be the best. Whatever I can do, whatever I’m asked to do, I’m glad to help."

He alluded to the elephant in the room, the resounding buzz of Saturday not being the right guy for this job.

"I can take all the shots," Saturday, 47, said, "and hopefully (the players) can do their jobs freely and (have) as few of distractions as possible and let them go play good football.”

But then the confidence that Brown says Saturday has that "is not arrogance," just the confidence gained from always having to prove himself, emerged.

"I spent 14 years in the locker room. I went to the playoffs 12 times," Saturday said. "I’ve got five dudes in the Hall of Fame that I played with. You don’t think I’ve seen greatness? You don’t think I’ve seen how people prepare, how they coach, how they GM, how they work? I’ve won a Super Bowl, been to two."

"Here’s the deal man, none of us are promised a good job. I may be terrible at this and after eight games, I’ll say, ‘God bless you. I am no good.’ I may be really good at it. I have no idea, but I dang sure ain’t going to back down."

People loved Saturday as a player. Most people do love those big guys on NFL teams, the centers, the leaders of the offensive line who know they aren't ever going to get the flashy kind of fame that comes with being a quarterback or wide receiver.

And people still love Saturday, even 10 years past being an NFL player, after becoming an ESPN analyst in 2013, the big guy who slimmed down but kept that same humble heart.

But NFL coach? They have their doubts.

“I know Jeff Saturday. I love him. … I hope Jeff sets it off, I hope he has success, I hope he can get some wins under his belt. But ultimately this is a bad look for the Indianapolis Colts, and this is a bad look for the NFL," said Marcus Spears on ESPN. "And for (Jim) Irsay to say, ‘I’m glad he don’t have no experience,’ what the hell is he talking about?"

'Coaching is coaching'

No experience as a head coach -- that's the Saturday athletic director Taylor Davis was looking at in 2017 when he hired Saturday as head football coach at Hebron Christian Academy in Dacula, Georgia.

Davis knows in the whole scheme of things, his hiring a coach is a microcosm of what happens in the NFL. But in a way, his hiring Saturday wasn't so different from the Colts hiring Saturday.

Saturday had been Hebron's offensive coordinator for two years when the head coaching job opened up. More than 100 applicants poured in with impressive resumes and experience. Davis narrowed the pool down to five candidates.

"They were all going to be really, really good coaches," Davis said. "But they weren't quite ready."

Saturday came in to Davis one day and told him if Davis got to a point where he didn't have the right person to coach, he would be glad to step in. Davis mulled that over and, like Irsay, went with Saturday.

"I had people with a lot of experience, who had head coaching on their resumes, however I was still in a position that none of these are the right fit at the right time," Davis said. "Jeff knew the community. He knew everyone. He knew the steps we needed to take to move the program forward."

All of that is what Saturday can bring to the Colts, Davis said. "He's been there before, he understands the culture and he's loved by the community. And he understands the job ahead of him."

And he is also one heck of a coach, Davis said.

Of course, it was high school coaching, and a small school at that, just 933 students in grades K-12 at Hebron. Saturday taught weight training classes by day and, in the heat of the late afternoons and those muggy Friday nights, made his mark as head football coach.

In his three seasons at Hebron, 2017-2019, Saturday led the team to a 21-16 record. In his final season, he took Hebron to its deepest playoff run in school history, reaching the quarterfinals of the Georgia High School Association state tournament.

More:Former Indianapolis Colts center Jeff Saturday is crushing it as a high school football coach

"But," UNC's Brown says, "coaching is coaching." Saturday will make his debut as NFL coach Sunday as the Colts take on the Las Vegas Raiders.

"The Colts knew, 'Hey, there are people with more experience but what is the best fit for right now?" Davis said. "What is the best answer for right now?"

For the Colts, it was Saturday. And now, Saturday the underdog has a chance to prevail again.

'I don’t think there's anything he can’t do'

"I guess I'll be pumping freakin' gas the rest of my life," Saturday said to his boss at the gas station that day back in 1998, choking back the tears after the resounding "no" from NFL scouts.

Seventeen years later, on the eve of his induction into the Indianapolis Colts Ring of Honor, Saturday laughed about that day. It's easy to laugh, he said, given what followed in his career.

Still, not many people were expecting the news that came this week, that Saturday would be named interim head coach of the Colts.

Brown was sitting in his office when Jeremy Sharpe, UNC's director of football communications and branding, walked in. "He said, 'Jeff Saturday is the new Indianapolis Colts coach.'"

His first thought was that it was a great hire. Then he heard the naysayers. And Brown started thinking back on that young kid who walked into UNC.

"He wasn't highly recruited out of high school. Everybody said he was too small and then he becomes probably the best center in school history," Brown said. "Then he didn't get drafted in the NFL and just happened to become one of the greatest centers to ever play in the NFL."

Saturday has so much more to offer as an NFL coach than people know, according to Brown. "He is smart, very confident, but not arrogant," Brown said. "He is an outstanding listener."

And people shouldn't take lightly what he accomplished at Hebron.

"Coaching ... it usually starts with communication, which leads to motivation and passion and energy. He’s got all of that," Brown said. "He’s been in that NFL locker room, A lot of coaches haven't been inside an NFL locker room. He's dealt with the Peyton Mannings and the superstars and gets it. He's lived that grind."

Brown loved listening to Saturday talk after his Colts hiring. He loved hearing him tell the world that he is here with the team to work alongside the players.

"That’s who he is (just one of the guys)," Brown said. "He’s really smart but he's loyal as the day is long.

"And he's just a guy that I don’t think there's anything he can’t do."

Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.