Conference championship games lack recognizable coaches

In the last 20 years, there have been exactly two men who won the Super Bowl as an unproven head coach. Mike Tomlin and Brian Billick had yet to establish themselves as big time NFL coaches until they won championships with the Steelers and Ravens, respectively.

In three weeks, we are guaranteed to include another coach in that not-so-elite group. The four teams remaining in the 2010 NFL playoffs are all led by coaches who have never even sniffed the Super Bowl as head men.

The AFC title game is the Rookie Coach Bowl, featuring the loyal assistant who inherited a championship-caliber franchise in the Colts’ Jim Caldwell, against the fiery defensive mastermind with Super Bowl pedigree who single-handedly changed the mindset of a team in the Jets’ Rex Ryan.

The NFC Championship features two coaches who have had mild success with their respective franchises, but have yet to reach the Super Bowl with talented teams.

Sean Payton led the Saints to the conference title game in 2006 before losing to the Bears, but besides that year New Orleans has not even reached that far. Brad Childress was a well-known offensive coordinator under Andy Reid in Philadelphia, but had yet to make the Vikings contenders until Brett Favre jumped on the ship before this season.

With Caldwell and Ryan, both coaches are in their first seasons with their respective teams, and both have endured seasons that could not have followed more dissimilar paths. Caldwell inherited a roster chocked full of stars, namely 2009 NFL MVP Peyton Manning. As an assistant under previous coach Tony Dungy, there was little to no transition within the locker room.

Quite frankly, despite Caldwell’s inexperience, the Colts were expected to make it this far.

Ryan is another story. The son of defensive mastermind Buddy, who coached the Bears to the Super Bowl XX title, Rex took over a team coming off an embarrassing finish to the 2008 season and started a rookie quarterback. The Jets were not picked to make the playoffs by practically everyone, and for good reason.

Ryan, who coached the defense for the Ravens before coming to New York, brought his high-wired, tell-it-like-it-is attitude to the Jets, and after a ho-hum 14 weeks, has the Jets soaring into Sunday’s game.

The rookie quarterback is Mark Sanchez, who struggled most of the season before the offense was scaled back late in the year to allow the Jets to play similar to Ryan’s Ravens of old. Like Baltimore in 2008, the Jets used a persistent running game and a suffocating defense to carry their rookie quarterback through to the playoffs.

Each of these coaches come from much different backgrounds to their respective teams, and each have varying levels of experience, but the common denominator between them all is the lack of big-game victories as head coaches.

As history suggests, the Super Bowl champion requires an experienced head coach who has been in the spotlight for several years at the highest level of the sport. The trend will be bucked this year, and one coach will take the leap from promising young coach to established winner.

The sacred threshold awaits, begging to be crossed.

Rodgers' patience paying off

Packers at Cardinals, Sunday, 4:00 p.m., FOX

If you’re a Packers fan, you know the story by now. In the 2005 NFL Draft, Aaron Rodgers waited for over four hours backstage before being selected by Green Bay with the 24^th pick.

It was a tumultuous start to a career that made Rodgers the heir apparent to a living legend. The moniker “Brett Favre’s successor” became inescapable for the next three seasons as Rodgers became the highest paid backup quarterback in the NFL.

In 2007, his third season in the league, Rodgers had his first encounter with the spotlight, when Favre was injured in the first quarter of a week 13 Thursday night game in Dallas.

Playing for the right to stay atop the NFC standings, Rodgers’ play was remarkable. Despite losing to the Cowboys 37-27, the Packers’ second-string quarterback threw for 201 yards and a touchdown, without an interception.

It was the kind of performance that rose more than a few eyebrows within the Packers’ organization. There was no longer any question of whether Rodgers could be a starting quarterback once Favre finally departed.

So what did the Packers do? After coming within seconds of an NFC Championship, which was lost after a costly Favre interception, he finally decided to retire. The Packers forced his hand, though, making him come to a decision much earlier than the typically undecided Favre would have liked.

It was clear that Green Bay was ready to open the Aaron Rodgers chapter of the franchise, and they were going to stop at nothing to make that happen.

In his first season with the keys to the offense all to himself, Rodgers lived up to most expectations. He was sixth in the league in passing efficiency and completed 63.6 percent of his passes. His 28 touchdown passes were fourth most in the NFL.

But that is not why Packers’ brass left the fate of the team in his hands, though. They expected Rodgers to win games, and he did not do a whole lot of that. A year removed from that NFC Championship appearance, the Packers finished 6-10.

Rodgers play in and of itself was better than expected, and quite frankly it was a defense that couldn’t keep teams out of the end zone enough that lost many of those ten games. Still, with success comes the glory, and with failure comes the blame for NFL quarterbacks, and Rodgers was feeling the heat.

In the offseason, management brought in respected defensive coordinator Dom Capers to fix the team’s woes and implore a 3-4 defense.

They also drafted B.J. Raji and Clay Matthews, two of the best defensive players available in the 2009 draft. It was clear that the Packers were committed to bringing the defense up to speed with Rodgers and the offense.

This season started out very ho-hum, going 4-4 in the first eight games. The offense was averaging 26.8 points per game, while the defense was allowing 21.5. The switch to the 3-4 defense was a work in progress, and the adjustment period was long.

The Packers figured it out finally, and proceeded to win seven of their final eight games. During that stretch, Rodgers threw for over 300 yards three times, and the defense allowed only 15.6 points per game.

With the strong finish down the stretch, Rodgers finally vindicated himself and evaded the Wisconsin-sized shadow Brett Favre had cast over his career.

He finished the season with 4,434 yards, 30 touchdowns and only seven interceptions. His numbers were good enough to be the fourth highest rated passes in 2009, and earned him his first Pro Bowl selection.

That’s all well and good, but Brett Favre set a standard on this team that includes more than Pro Bowl berths. Super Bowls are the standard against which all success is measured in Green Bay. It’s been a long five years before Rodgers could even taste the playoffs as a starter.

He’s used to waiting though.