View
Tickets Online
2011 Pittsburgh Steelers
The Hard Road of Steelers' Tight End Coach James Daniel
Even with all the uncertainty surrounding today's harsh economic times, it may be better not to worry about what's up the road ahead. Sometimes life's best perspective is simply caught with a glimpse in the rear-view mirror. Just ask Pittsburgh Steelers tight ends coach James Daniel, whose football career went from one scary bus ride in the 1960s to multiple ticker-tape parades when he received his second championship ring following their most recent Super Bowl XLIII title in Tampa this year. Click Here to Read More
Football1.org buys and sells 2011 Pittsburgh Steelers packages and tickets online and has the largest selection of Pittsburgh Steelers tickets. If you want to attend Pittsburgh Steelers, Football1.org is your number one source.
Football1.org provides Pittsburgh Steelers schedules, Pittsburgh Steelers venue maps and seating charts and much more Pittsburgh Steelers information. Football1.org has the biggest inventory of 2011 Pittsburgh Steelers tickets, but if you can't find the Pittsburgh Steelers tickets you want, please contact us toll free at 800-770-7691 to talk to our Pittsburgh Steelers ticket specialists. You can buy Pittsburgh Steelers tickets from our website, Football1.org 24/7 online. Call today for Pittsburgh Steelers tickets. Let Football1.org be your Pittsburgh Steelers ticket source.Pittsburgh Steelers tickets will bring a smile to any fan’s face. |
Continue...
But Daniel's football career didn't start at the top. Actually, according to media accounts available at the team website, it started off so low he wasn't even allowed to enter his hometown school until his teenage years. He was one of the first five black players to play for the Wetumpka Indians when the team integrated in 1967. The school itself integrated a year earlier, but up until then, black students attended W.B. Doby High School, which ironically, was located about 400 yards from Wetumpka's Hohenberg Field.
Daniel grew up on a farm, and during his youth, athletics was just an outlet for him when he got away from the farm—allowing him to relax.He was a sophomore when he transfered to WHS, along with four juniors including his older brother, Willie Joe Daniel. And of course, he tried out for football and Wetumpka, and did quite well. He was warmly received by the entire team in 1966.
Heading into the 1967 campaign, Daniel's new team had lost 22 seniors, most of them contributing players from the 1966 team. In fact, there were only eight seniors on the '67 team with just five returning lettermen, which led his coach, Sheldon Darnell, to label the campaign as a rebuilding season. And he was right, four weeks into the season the Indians were holding a disappointing 0-4 record.
But what transpired in Week 5 would remain etched across Daniel's memory banks for the rest of his life – even as much as his two Super Bowl wins.
The Indians traveled to visit a 4-1 Clanton team that was celebrating their homecoming. Throughout the tough, hard-fought game, the Indians defense had forced Clanton into a number of mistakes, and they eventually pulled off a 6-0 upset when Daniel's older brother, Willie Joe, hauled in a 17-yard touchdown pass that proved to be the game's only score.
But it was after the game that the intensity hit an entirely different level.
Daniel recalled asking the coaching staff to suggest a place to eat downtown. That particular night when they arrived place where they were supposed to eat, there was a crowd of thugs grouped up outside and they told Daniel and the others that no blacks would ever be able to eat where they ate. And they would not let the players go into the restaurant. Coach Holley the group's leader and began slamming his head against the wall. While the coach did this, and created a distraction, the players were able to go inside, along with the cheerleaders.
The school's principal went to speak with the police after they arrived, yet even the police would not help. So the group called the Highway Patrol, who eventually showed up and escorted the players and cheerleaders from the restaurant and onto the bus.
Daniel has also said, in publicly-released statements, that one of the keys to the incident was that Clanton had not yet made the integration transition, this coupled with the game's outcome fueled the Friday night fire.
"They were a little upset that we won the ball game and they were a little upset that we were an integrated football team. Integration hadn't occurred there at the time. We would always stop and eat as a team. We stopped there at a restaurant that was part of a hotel, that was where they determined we were going to eat after that ball game. And when we went to the restaurant, they objected to us eating there. We ended up eating but we didn't have much of an appetite after we went through everything we went through," Daniel said, who went on to play college football at Alabama State University.
After his playing days, James Daniel moved straight into coaching, and helped Enterprise High School win a 4A state championship as an assistant coach. As time went by, he was given an opportunity to move into the college coaching ranks when he was added to Pat Dye's staff at Auburn University coaching the offensive line, and eventually the tight ends. During his 12 seasons, the Tigers were invited to nine post-season bowl games and four of the linemen he coached were named to All-American teams.
In his final two seasons at Auburn, Daniel was part of an NFL internship program where=2 0he met Dan Reeves. Eventually Daniel was offered a coaching slot on Reeves' staff with the New York Giants (1993-96) and later in Atlanta, where he helped coach the Falcons to Super Bowl XXXIII. After the 2003 season, there was no doubt Daniel had become a seasoned and proven-worthy NFL coach, a commodity held in high regard by cities that have won Super Bowls. So when the Atlanta Falcons job ended, the Pittsburgh Steelers immediately came calling.
"People want to know what your goals are as a coach. I tell people that my goal as a coach is to be the best assistant football coach that any head coach would want. And then let everything else transpire from there. I think people get caught up in the, 'Well, I'm here right now, but 10 years from now I want to be here.' If you do that you loose focus. If you do a good enough job then an opportunity should present itself. Hopefully it will, and if it don't then it don't," Daniel said.
And in the meantime, Daniel won't be fretting over a steering wheel on the Steeler's road to repeat as champions. He has his the car pointed straight ahead with one eye in the rear-view mirror as a reminder that sometimes there are bumps in the road, but they don't bring the journey to a halt.
|
Atlanta Falcons