By navigating a winding road, Leslie Frazier sees the future as whats important

Publish date: 2024-05-17

Editor’s note: Throughout the NFL season, The Athletic is telling the stories of Black coaches who have been identified as having the qualities to become head coaches. To read the profiles of other candidates, click here.

Tre’Davious White hardly ever intercepted passes in practice, and it bothered Leslie Frazier.

If the 2017 first-round pick could become an interceptor, Frazier thought, he would be a complete player, a Pro Bowl player, and maybe even an MVP candidate.

So the Bills’ defensive coordinator asked the cornerback to stay on the field after practice and work with him.

Forty years earlier, Frazier had gone to Alcorn State as a wide receiver. He moved to cornerback, but he kept doing wide receiver drills after practice when everyone else went in. In college, he picked off 20 passes in three years.

Then he played cornerback in the NFL, and he continued doing wide receiver drills. In three full seasons as a starter for the Bears, Frazier had 18 interceptions, the second most by any cornerback during that time span.

Frazier thought the drills could benefit White as they had helped him. “I had him run routes like wide receivers and had him get used to catching balls in positions he normally wouldn’t be in as a defensive back,” Frazier says. “I had him catch some balls off the Jugs machine, including shooting the ball really high, making him track the football.”

Last season, White tied for the NFL lead in interceptions and made the Pro Bowl for the first time. Before this season began, White signed a contract extension worth $70 million that, at the time, made him the highest-paid cornerback in NFL history. He has played well in the Bills’ 4-0 start.

Long ago, Frazier learned he could gain an edge by doing something no one else was doing. It is a lesson he has passed on to others.

In the course of playing for Alcorn State and the Bears, and in 32 years of coaching, Frazier learned lesson after lesson. And he taught lesson after lesson.

Those lessons define him.

Lesson: Discipline is critical, but you can discipline with love.

Frazier’s coach at Alcorn State, the legendary Marino Casem, was a stern man, the kind of coach who intimidates his players.

After Frazier’s freshman season, he went to see Casem, whom they called “The Godfather.” He told him he wanted to play baseball in addition to football. Casem was not amused by the request.

Casem (in a booming voice): “Frazier! Why are you coming here talking to me about baseball! What do you think we are doing here?”

Frazier: “Coach, I thought I’d mention it. I like playing baseball and think I could help the team.”

Casem sat back in his chair and paused.

Casem: “I’m glad you came and talked to me. I want you to play baseball. It would help you and help us. You are different, and you can handle it.”

Frazier became the captain of the baseball team.

Football was Frazier’s primary sport, but he missed most of his senior season with hamstring issues and was underrated in the draft process. The Bears brought him to Chicago for a workout and asked him to run a 40-yard dash. Frazier refused because he didn’t want to reinjure himself.

Bears general manager Jim Finks was ready to move on from Frazier, but Casem lobbied Finks, telling him if signed Frazier as an undrafted free agent, he would become a starter. Finks gave Frazier a chance, thanks to Casem.

When Frazier became the full-time head coach of the Vikings in 2011, he was intent on instilling discipline. He knew it was essential to be respected by players. Percy Harvin, a first-round pick in 2009, kept causing waves until Frazier suspended him. Then Harvin was traded.

But there was another side to Frazier as a head coach.

When Adrian Peterson was young and immature, Frazier put his arm around his shoulder. “There was a period when he was becoming self-destructive,” Frazier says. “We had a lot of hard conversations about life, where his life could possibly end if things didn’t change.”

In Frazier’s final days as the Vikings’ head coach in 2013, Peterson went to the team ownership to endorse Frazier.

Last season, after Frazier and the Bills faced Peterson, then with Washington, the two men embraced. Peterson told him Frazier’s influence was one of the reasons he settled down and got married.

That victory isn’t on Frazier’s head-coaching record, but it’s as important to him as any.

Lesson: Don’t ignore your players.

“Pudding” is what Buddy Ryan called Frazier when Ryan was his defensive coordinator with the Bears. He called him that because his coverage was smooth as pudding.

In 1984, Frazier looked at the Bears’ game plan against the Raiders, the defending Super Bowl champions. Ryan was asking Frazier to play press coverage every play against wide receiver Cliff Branch, one of the fastest players in the NFL.

Frazier told Ryan he didn’t feel comfortable pressing Branch every play.

Said Ryan, “You do whatever you feel comfortable with, Pudding. You just have to cover him,”

Frazier mixed up his techniques and held Branch without a catch in the Bears’ 7-3 victory.

Frazier learned something that day. “I want to hear our players’ thoughts,” he says. “I want to see how they see the game plan, and make sure they are comfortable. There are times when I have to say, ‘Nope, we’re not doing it that way.’ But it’s important to listen to them, and I learned that from Buddy.”

Frazier has given Bills middle linebacker Tremaine Edmunds the green light to change to outside technique when the call requires him to play inside technique. He has also told Edmunds he can override a call if he sees something he thinks he can exploit.

Leslie Frazier, right, has learned the importance of trusting players such as Taron Johnson and Tremaine Edmunds. (Perry Knotts / Associated Press)

Last season, Frazier called for Edmunds to drop into coverage with the Browns on their own 8-yard line. Edmunds saw a weakness in the protection, changed the call to a blitz and sacked Baker Mayfield in the end zone for a safety.

“He’s humble enough to allow suggestions,” former Bills linebacker Lorenzo Alexander says. “I have been around some people who won’t do that at all. It shows the type of man he is and how secure he is. It’s not about him. It’s not about his ego. It’s about what’s best for his team.”

Lesson: Go where the tide takes you.

It starts above the kneecap to the right, then bends to the left before straightening out down the middle of his shin, a winding road of a scar.

It must be 7 inches long.

Many people don’t know that at 26, Frazier was a superior player on arguably the best defense in the history of pro football. Yes, that’s him in the back row of “The Super Bowl Shuffle.” His contract was up after the 1985 season, and he was in line to be paid as one of the game’s best cornerbacks.

But in the second quarter of Super Bowl XX, everything changed. The Bears tried a reverse on a punt return. The return man called for a fair catch, fielded the punt anyway and pitched it to Frazier. As Frazier tried to take off, his left foot got stuck in the artificial turf.

Torn were his ACL and PCL; gone was his range of motion and livelihood.

After the surgery, which was primitive by today’s standards, he attempted a comeback but failed two physicals. Frazier figured he would go into the business world.

At the time, Trinity College in Deerfield, Ill., was starting a football program. Frazier lived about 15 minutes from the school and stopped by the bookstore from time to time. School president Kenneth Meyer was a Bears fan who knew about Frazier, and he thought he was the right person to coach the team and implement the school’s Christian values.

Frazier wasn’t interested. Meyer stayed after him.

Frazier ended up coaching at Trinity for nine years, and he did more than coach. He ordered the equipment, lined the fields and he made sure his student-athletes fulfilled their vows by attending chapel thrice weekly and not drinking or dancing.

Today, the sign outside the stadium welcomes visitors to Leslie Frazier Field.

“Who knows? If I had gotten another contract and not gotten injured and played a long time, maybe I don’t go into coaching,” Frazier says. “Maybe my life is totally different. … There’s no doubt that experience prepared me for some of the things I face today and helped shape me into the person I am.”

From Trinity, Frazier went to Illinois as a defensive backs coach. Then he served as an NFL assistant for parts of 13 seasons before the Vikings promoted him to interim head coach in 2010, and then gave him the job permanently the following year. He was fired three years later.

Frazier moved on gracefully, as he did after Super Bowl XX.

“My faith helped me get through those moments,” he says. “I can’t undo the past, but I can learn from it and grow from it. What’s most important now for me is the future, not the past. I can’t look back and say, ‘Woe is me,’ or ‘Why did this happen?’ It’s over. What’s most important is now. What am I doing here in Buffalo to help the Bills and our defense be successful?”

Lesson: Maintain an even keel.

Frazier expected Andy Reid to show his temper in response to poor performances, as other coaches in his life had.

Reid never did.

Frazier is convinced that’s a significant reason why Reid now has the seventh-most wins in NFL history. “When the Chiefs got down in the playoffs last year, there was no panic because there’s no panic with Andy,” says Frazier, who was an assistant to Reid with the Eagles from 1999 to 2002. “He’s steady Eddie. That carries over to the team. … Some people say he should be more fiery, be more angry. But he’s himself.”

In a 2017 game against the Saints, the Bills struggled to contain running backs Mark Ingram and Alvin Kamara. As the Saints racked up yards and points, head coach Sean McDermott yelled, assistant coaches cursed and players bickered.

Frazier’s demeanor didn’t change. By the look on his face, nobody could tell if he was holding deuces or a royal flush.

“He had the calmness to bring the guys together in a firm tone,” Alexander says. “He talked to us in a way that didn’t come across as panicked or worried or upset. We didn’t win the game, but I felt he settled us so we could get back to who we were, in contrast to some other coaches who I thought acted out of character.”

Lesson: Don’t compromise your character.

When Frazier worked for Tony Dungy with the Colts in 2005 and 2006, he experienced a coach who was different from every other he had known. “He was about his faith, and he never felt he had to compromise what he believed in,” Frazier says.

It was then Frazier realized he could be like Dungy.

In recent years, Frazier has become a mentor to younger coaches, as Dungy long has been.

When Frazier was hired by the Ravens in 2016 to coach the secondary, defensive backs coach Chris Hewitt was telling Frazier how the Ravens did things. Frazier stopped him.

Frazier: “Chris, do you know every other word you are saying is a cuss word? You have to work on that cursing.”

Hewitt: “Les, I had no idea I cursed that much.”

Frazier: “Well, you do.”

Hewitt: “All right. I’m going to try to stop cursing.”

They had a nickname for Frazier in the Ravens’ coaching offices: “Saint Les.”

“He’s one of those people that there’s nothing bad you can say about him,” Hewitt says. “He’s helped me become more grounded with the Bible, prayer, being more consistent with prayer, waking up in the morning having a routine, spending some time with the Lord. That helps me relate to my players more and pass something to them besides football.”

Lesson: Stamp your personality on your team.

Frazier admired how the Ravens always played with fervor. He understood why when he joined them in 2016. They reflect their head coach, John Harbaugh.

“He’s a very intense guy, as most people know … very fiery,” Frazier says. “It’s clear the Ravens are a John Harbaugh-coached team in their personality. And I do think it’s important the team mirrors its coach. In order for the team to mirror the head coach, you have to make sure they feel you in the meetings and in practice.”

Even though Frazier isn’t a head coach, the Bills still feel him.

Defensive lineman Jordan Phillips would advise others not to mistake Frazier’s geniality for softness.

After Phillips’ second practice with the Bills once he was claimed on waivers in October 2018, Frazier approached him with a cold stare. “Jordan, if you ever practice like that again, you won’t be here very long,” he told him.

Phillips was stunned. “As a player, you’re sitting there like, ‘Wow, what does this guy have against me?’ That was my first impression of Coach Les.”

Phillips joined the Bills with a reputation. He was considered an underachiever in Miami, a second-round pick who failed to realize his potential.

So, Frazier challenged him after his second practice — and many times that year.

“What am I gonna get today?” he yelled as Phillips was stretching with his teammates during warmups. “Are you gonna cheat the Pegulas out of their money? I want to know.”

Whenever Phillips had a subpar series, Frazier showed the whole team the tape with his laser pointed at Phillips. “Is this Pro Bowl-caliber play by Phillips?” Frazier would ask. “Somebody tell me what he’s doing here.”

“I had never seen that approach before, so it threw me for a loop,” Phillips says. “But it’s definitely effective.”

Frazier had several “hard conversations” with Adrian Peterson while coaching the Vikings. (Nam Y. Huh / Associated Press)

After the 2018 season, Phillips’ contract was up. His choice was to re-sign with the Bills or go elsewhere and take a similar deal. Frazier told him he wanted him, that he would be a big part of the defense, and he promised to have his back. Phillips returned on a one-year deal.

When Phillips went through a tough stretch in 2019, Frazier stood by him. Phillips had a breakout season with 9.5 sacks, then signed a three-year, $30 million contract with the Cardinals.

“It was his belief in me that catapulted me to the level of play I played at this last year,” Phillips says. “He’s helped my family more than he’ll ever know. He’s done things for me spiritually and financially that no one’s been able to do before. He’ll forever be one of the greatest guys, greatest coaches, and greatest members of my family. And it’s crazy how it all came about because he’s a guy that I thought I would never get along with. Now he’s one of the favorite coaches I’ve ever had.”

Lesson: Don’t forget what got you here.

McDermott is a former defensive coordinator. He is still very involved in the defense.

At halftime of a rough game two years ago, McDermott took over play-calling responsibilities from Frazier. But he put Frazier back in charge the following week.

McDermott and Frazier meet more than once every week to go over the game plan. Frazier tells him what he’d like to do, why he’d like to do it that way and how he intends on doing it. McDermott raises any concerns, then he lets Frazier do his thing.

“Leslie runs the defense,” McDermott says. “He does a phenomenal job. And from time to time, he has me bothering him. He’s handled that extremely well, to no surprise. He has tremendous grace and a great listening ear. … At the end of the day, it’s the Bills’ defense, but Leslie makes the calls. He’s at the tip of the spear on this thing.”

Frazier thinks McDermott does it right, and if he ever gets the chance to be a head coach again, he will be more involved in the defense than he was in Minnesota. “I probably got too far away from my defensive background,” he says. “You do need to be a CEO as a head coach, but I think you do still need to be involved with the defense if that’s your background. I think I removed myself too much, and that created a problem.”

Lesson: Credit doesn’t matter.

When Frazier first worked with McDermott 21 years ago in Philadelphia, McDermott was like a kid brother on the coaching staff, a 25-year-old whose responsibilities included getting coffee for Reid.

Now, Frazier treasures the chance to serve him. Nothing gave him more pleasure than seeing McDermott mentioned as a coach of the year candidate in 2019.

“It’s humbling, very humbling,” McDermott says of his relationship with Frazier. “When I was in Philadelphia, he and Steve Spagnuolo were our secondary coaches. I really looked up to those two because of how well they worked together and the quality of their work. I was just a sponge learning from them.”

In McDermott, Frazier sees a leader who gives respect and credit and doesn’t look for credit in return.

Frazier isn’t only the defensive coordinator on the Bills. He’s also the assistant head coach, and it isn’t just a title. McDermott has leaned on him for advice about scheduling, hiring assistant coaches, disciplinary issues, the remote offseason, kneeling or standing during the national anthem and handling uncomfortable racial matters.

The Bills’ victories are credited to McDermott, but Frazier gets as much satisfaction from each. “You learn when you have success, everybody is going to benefit,” he says. “You don’t have to get caught up in beating your chest or pat yourself on the back. … If you’re not concerned about that part of it, you have a great chance of being successful.”

Everybody starts out with none of it.

It comes drip by drip, like fluids from an IV bag.

The more you experience, the more of it you have, like wrinkles around the eyes.

You notice it only in time, like bigger biceps after doing curls over and over.

Wisdom comes from lessons, and lessons crowd Frazier’s mind.

“He’s a man that’s full of wisdom,” McDermott says. “That’s how people on our staff and around the league view him. Because of that, throughout the day, you’ll find people in his office that he’s spending time with for football reasons, but also for life reasons.”

Frazier is 61. He has experienced ultimate success, winning Super Bowl rings as a player and as an assistant coach with the Colts. He knows failure, too, having been unable to prevent the Vikings from going 5-10-1 after a 10-6 season.

From the sensory overload of the Superdome on Super Bowl Sunday to the colorless, silent sterility of an operating room, Frazier has experienced it all.

He felt the hawk coming in hard off Lake Michigan, chapping the skin on his face, and he felt the gentle breeze from the Gulf of Mexico cutting the thick Florida air.

They blew the Gjallarhorn for him at the old Met, and they booed his defense with animus at the old Vet.

He started his own football program — how many NFL coaches can say that?

He has worked for world-class coaches. He has touched extraordinary players, including Peterson, Walter Payton, Brett Favre and Peyton Manning.

He has been married to Gale for 38 years, and they are parents to Kieron, an attorney, Chantel, a psychologist, and Corey, a pro scout with the Ravens, and now they are grandparents to 5-year-old Holland.

There aren’t many qualities more important to an NFL head coach than wisdom. But you wouldn’t know it based on the amount of interest in Frazier in the last seven hiring cycles.

No teams interviewed Frazier this year even though the Bills improved from 6-10 to 10-6, and they have had a top-five defense twice in the last three years. Since being fired by the Vikings, he was interviewed for a head-coaching position only by the Colts. That was after they were left hanging by Josh McDaniels and the perceived desirable candidates had been hired.

The Colts chose Frank Reich instead of Frazier, but Frazier impressed general manager Chris Ballard. “I have no doubt Leslie could do a really good job in the right situation as head coach because he’s a leader of men,” Ballard says.

One could say the system has failed Frazier.

Of course, Frazier finds a lesson in it: Control what you can and forget the rest.

“If my career ended with Buffalo being my last stop as defensive coordinator, I’ll be able to enjoy my retirement, I promise you,” he says. “I will not have regrets. As much as I would have loved for someone to have called this last offseason, it’s out of my control. So, if nobody calls before my time is up as a coach, I’m going to be fine with that because it means it wasn’t meant to be.”

Being a head coach would enable Frazier to share more of what he’s been given. Not being a head coach won’t stop him, however.

He has taken an interest in many younger coaches, including African Americans such as Hewitt, Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, Falcons defensive coordinator Raheem Morris and Dolphins running backs coach Eric Studesville.

After being introduced to Colts quarterbacks coach Marcus Brady a little over a year ago, Frazier advised him on how to prepare for career advancement, going so far as to walk him through how to develop a PowerPoint presentation about breaking down staff responsibilities.

“He gives good advice,” Brady says.

“If I can shed some light on what it was like to be a head coach and what some of the traps can be, and then some of those guys get an opportunity and become successful, that would mean a lot to me,” Frazier says. “It happened for me, and it can happen for some of these young guys coming up. They just have to keep believing and praying and not become bitter. I feel it’s incumbent to encourage them.”

Frazier may be a head coach again.

Or not.

Either way, his lessons will carry on.

(Top photo: Brett Carlsen / Getty Images)

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By navigating a winding road, Leslie Frazier sees the future as whats important