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Even though I don't yet know Mississippi State defensive coordinator Manny Diaz particularly well, I already feel a kinship with him. As you can read in today's feature on Diaz, his first career was in journalism.
He received a degree in communications from Florida State in 1995, was sports editor of the student newspaper there, interned at ESPN, and then became a full-time employee there his first two years out of college. He was a production assistant for the "NFL Countdown" program.
But with the encouragement of ESPN analyst Sterling Sharpe, Diaz decided to pursue coaching, and that's turned out pretty well. But one wonders where he would be had he remained at ESPN.
"He was in a good spot at ESPN. Who knows what he would've been," said friend Bruce Feldman, who writes for ESPN.com and ESPN The Magazine, and does some TV work. "A lot of the guys who are around Manny's age – maybe they weren't in the same group, but they roughly started then – they're senior coordinating producers and pretty high up."
The move to coaching was a bit surprising, even to Diaz's own father, also named Manny. The elder Diaz, at attorney who served as Miami's mayor from 2001-09, said, "He's a pretty thoughtful person. Even when he was young, as much as a father always thinks he knows best, and you give your advice, he generally made some pretty good decisions. While I was surprised when he made this decision, obviously he knew what he was doing, and it's worked out well for him. I'm very proud of him."
Diaz played high school football. He was a defensive back for Miami Country Day, but he decided to focus on journalism in college. He thought that was the best way to remain tied into the world of sports. Now he knows better.
"The truth of the matter is, and this is the whole thing, is that I think your job is cool because you get an access to things that the standard person doesn't," he told me. "But I just think that my job is cooler. I wanted to be as close to the inside of the circle as I possibly could. And that to me is one of the great things about journalism, you get a lot of access, you get inside the circle a lot of people don't get into. But inherently you're never all the way inside the circle."
He's done well on the inside, quickly rising up the coaching ranks from Florida State to N.C. State to Middle Tennessee State to Mississippi State. (Interesting, so many State schools.) MTSU coach Rick Stockstill, and old-school kind of guy, lauded Diaz's computer skills.
"To me it's his ability to use the computer and analyze what other offenses are doing and break them down," Stockstill said.
The schemes used by Diaz have proved quite effective. Last season, the Blue Raiders ranked first in the Sun Belt Conference in sacks, second in scoring defense and third in total defense. Stockstill credited two things: A) good players, and B) Diaz's focus on fundamentals.
"I thought what we did defensively from a schematic standpoint was good," Stockstill said. "But the thing that enabled us to be good at it schematically was fundamentally we were a good tackling team, and we didn't give up big plays."
MSU assistant coach Melvin Smith compared Diaz's schemes with those run by ex-MSU defensive coordinator Joe Lee Dunn.
"We're probably a little more diverse coverage-wise than they were here with Joe Lee," Diaz said. "But I think at the same point, they did such a great job here back then by being an offensive defense. And certainly that's something that we want to try and do as well."
Diaz feels his journalism experience has benefited him as a coach, and Feldman can see why, drawing a comparison between preparing for a live broadcast and a football game. "I think there's a lot of similarities between that and getting ready for a game, the preparation and the anxiety, and people are on edge working for that."
Both are right up Diaz's alley.
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