Legendary Jets special teams guru Mike Westhoff is done with football. He says he's OK now but when he stepped down from his position as the Broncos' assistant head coach midway through the 2024 season due to a sudden vision issue, he knew it was time to retire to Florida.
"I was ready anyway," Westhoff said. "Seventh-eight, that's enough."
But he has found out, in between sessions of catch-and-release shark fishing near his Fort Myers home, that the game is not done with him. The Pro Football Hall of Fame has announced that Westhoff is one of three NFL coaches who will receive Awards of Excellence from the Hall for jobs well done in the assistant coach category.
"It's very, very much a privilege and an honor," Westhoff said of being recognized for his 33 seasons of what he and many others recognize as revolutionizing NFL special teams play. Mike and his fellow honored contributors in five categories will be feted at a cocktail dinner and awards luncheon to celebrate their careers June 24-25 in Canton. Bobb McKittrick and Ted Cottrell will also be assistatnt coach honorees in the awards program's fifth class.
"I'm happy I can share this with so many," Westhoff said. "We're going to have a party afterwards. I can't wait. A lot of guys are coming from all over. I'm just so anxious to be able to see them and thank them and mention in our private format what they did and how they contributed."
Although the news was just officially announced by the HOF on Monday, word leaked out as it will when one of the game's greats in his chosen field is being recognized by the Hall. For Westhoff, that includes stops with Indianapolis (1982-84), Miami (1986-2000), the Jets (2001-12), New Orleans (2017-18) and Denver (2023-24).
He always proudly says he was one of the best ST coaches around, as he was, but many others noted that as well. **As he told the Denver Gazette last week**, "I don't think anybody did it better than me. [NFL Commissioner] Roger Goodell was quoted in my book as saying, 'Mike Westhoff changed the game.' "
After coaching stops with five colleges in eight years plus those three seasons with the Colts and one with the USFL's Arizona Outlaws, Westhoff's first long-term stop at pulling apart and putting back together the whole concept of NFL special teams was under Don Shula with the Dolphins.
"The thing I learned from Coach Shula that was the most important thing in my career was it's not what you want to do, it's what they can do. So figure it out. That's what I did my whole career."
Decades later, "Figure It Out" became the title for Westhoff's book on how he and his many friends in uniform revolutionized the frequently overlooked but always pivotal unit in pro football's offense-defense-special teams trinity.
The part of the career the Jets and their fans know best began in 2001, when first-time head coach Herm Edwards tabbed him as the Green & White's special teams coach (later coordinator) and he never missed a season of having input into the Jets specialists, even though he was sidelined in 2008 as he waged his well-known battle against cancer of the femur that required close to a dozen operations over his lifetime.
"The Jets were in the playoffs nearly every single year I was there," Westhoff said, and he's arguably on the money as the team played in the postseason in six of his 12 seasons. "Were they perfect? Nobody's perfect. But they were pretty damn good. I had fun. I loved it."
The Jets' special teams highlights during the Westhoff years are many. He mentions the 2001 regular-season finale at Oakland, which the Jets won on John Hall's 53-yard field goal, 24-22, to get into the playoffs, and the 2002 opener at Buffalo, with Chad Morton's two kickoff-return TDs, the second to start OT lifting the Jets to the 37-31 victory, as two of his favorites games.
Among the Green & White specialists, he recalled return/cover man Chris Hayes as "a consummate football player," and then there were his kick returners — Leon Washington, Justin Miller, Brad Smith, Joe McKnight, Santana Moss and Morton — who were the core of the nine different players to produce at least one kick-return TD, with the group combining for 20 return scores in those 12 years.
"I've always been a big believer in the 'we" factor," he said. "I'm glad we could dominate in games with starting field position, blocked kicks, making plays that helped us win. That's what I cared about.
"And being good in New York, there's nothing like it. It's the best. There's nothing like it anywhere in the country. The people are the greatest. So for me, I loved every minute of my time in New York."
The Awards of Excellence honor entire careers, of course, and Westhoff has left his mark around the country. The respected annual special teams rankings by Rick Gosselin give an idea of Iron Mike's impact:
■ In 2000, the Jets ranked 23rd in the NFL among special teams units. The next year, Westhoff arrived and lifted the Green & White specialists to 15th, then ninth in 2002. In his dozen seasons at the ST controls, the Jets had a top-10 finish five times, including fourth in 2006 and then fifth-seventh-ninth from 2009-11.
■ In 2016, the year before Westhoff's arrival in New Orleans, the Saints were ranked 25th. In his first season at the helm in '17, they improved to 14th. In '18 they came in second in the league, behind only the Jets at No. 1, coordinated by Brant Boyer. Surprising 1-2 finish? Nah. Westhoff helped in the Dolphins' drafting of Boyer as a sixth-round special-teams demon-to-be in 1993.
■ The Broncos in 2022, a year before Westhoff arrived as AHC, ranked 25th in the NFL among special teams. In '23, that ranking improved 18 slots to No. 7 in the league.the Broncos, Westhoff worked closely with special teams coordinator Ben Kotwica, alsoa former Jets ST coach, and with assistant ST coordinator Chris Banjo, who was a standout special teamer under Westhoff in New Orleans and is the Green & White's current special teams coordinator.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame established the Awards of Excellence in 2022 to recognize significant contributors to the game in "behind-the-scenes" roles. In addition to assistant coaches, the program honors career athletic trainers, equipment managers, public relations directors and film/video directors. The five groups presenting these awards create their own selection committees and set their own criteria for choosing new members. The Hall of Fame does not participate in any nominating or voting.
