Al Saunders is so competitive that he used to run five marathons a year — three as training runs and two to win.
He is so competitive that when he was an assistant coach in Kansas City with the Chiefs, he would park his car 10 miles from the practice facility and run to work. Then, at the end of the long coaching day, he would run back to his car.
He is so competitive that when he talks about his newest job with the Ravens — coaching the team's young receivers — he says: "In our classroom, nobody can fail. In our classroom, everybody has to get A's."
Understand this about the Ravens' senior offensive assistant: Saunders approaches everything he does with a conviction and dedication to win. In his world, there are no shortcuts, detours or regrets.
What the 63-year-old London native brings to Westminster next week for the start of training camp is 39 years of coaching expertise — some of it with the best offensive teams in NFL history — and boundless enthusiasm.
Saunders' favorite classroom as a coach has always been the 120-yard by 531/3-yard rectangle where players learn the game and earn their stripes. That's where he gets his biggest kick, his most satisfaction.
That will be obvious to fans who attend the Ravens' practices at McDaniel College this summer. What they will see is an assistant coach always on the move. In a typical practice during a typical passing camp in June, Saunders skittered about the field in a choreographed fit of hyperactivity.
Play after offensive play, Saunders would break the huddle with players, assume a studied position along the sideline, jog down the field after the ball and, upon his return, sidle up to a young receiver offering pointers. Sometimes he would sneak up behind a player after the play and try to knock the ball out of his grasp, delivering Lesson 1 in ball security.
"Oh, my gosh, is he unbelievable or what?" coach John Harbaugh gushed after one June workout. "You know, Al's a marathon-type guy. He's in great shape. Yeah, Al runs around and coaches hard."
It's a routine Saunders has always followed, one that only a handful of other NFL assistants emulate. He said he learned it from John McKay when Saunders was a graduate assistant at Southern California in 1970.
Instant feedback, he said, is the best time to plant a correction or a compliment in a player's head.
"I always heard stories about what a great coach Al was," offensive coordinator Cam Cameron said. "We're just thrilled that we have him. He's a great resource for me. He has so much expertise in so many areas."
Saunders was out of a job last summer — fired by the Rams when Scott Linehan's staff was removed — before joining the Ravens as a consultant. He handled special game-plan projects for Cameron and served as another voice of experience on the pass offense that was handed down from the late Don Coryell.
In the offseason, the decision was made to give Saunders hands-on responsibility with the players. It was a move he readily embraced.
"The game is so competitive, so physically, emotionally and mentally draining, that the time on the field for a coach is your classroom," he said. "For me, it's the most enjoyable part of the day. When the players transfer something you've shown them in the classroom to the field, it's really an exciting thing."
Going into training camp, Saunders' role will be to assist tight ends coach Wade Harman and tutor rookie tight ends Ed Dickson and Dennis Pitta. But his background is so all-encompassing — he was head coach of the San Diego Chargers for two full seasons in 1987 and 1988 — that Saunders could wind up doing almost anything.
What he won't do, though, is run another marathon. He said he gave it up in 1998 after running six that year, including his fifth Boston Marathon. He won often and was 5K national champion in the masters division of the Road Runners Club of America in 1996.
But after running his second sub-three-hour marathon in the San Diego Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in 1998, he decided running was taking too much of his time.
"I'm a little obsessive-compulsive in the area of competition," Saunders said. "So it became such a demand on me physically and on my time. I would finish work at 1 or 2 in the morning and I'd go run 10 or 12 miles. And I'd feel guilty if I didn't run every day. I wanted to win. … So I thought, 'This is not good. I don't need to do this. We compete enough on Sunday that I don't need to compete with myself anymore.'"
The indefatigable Saunders, who was a former All-America Amateur Athletic Union swimmer and national record holder after moving from England to Canada to Oakland, Calif., at a young age, still runs an hour a day, though.
In the twilight of an NFL career that featured prolific passing teams in San Diego, St. Louis and Kansas City, Saunders sees something special in the job Harbaugh is doing in Baltimore.
"The thing that's really enjoyable to me at this stage of my career is, it's really a privilege to work for John," Saunders said. "I've worked for Don Coryell, Dick Vermeil, Marty Schottenheimer and for Joe Gibbs, four of the most respected head coaches in the game. And John is a young one of those. He's got a tremendous feel for the team and the players individually.
"This is an organization that has a chance to be a dominant team in the NFL. You've got [strong] ownership, head football coach and general manager," he said, referring to Steve Bisciotti, Harbaugh and Ozzie Newsome, respectively. "And you couldn't have a better three that not only work together, they all have the same vision. … There's no reason this can't be, if it's not already, one of the marquee franchises in the NFL. And we will win here."
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