Last year, the Cincinnati Bengals turned some heads by bringing aboard former Cleveland Browns head coach Hue Jackson in November.
Jackson had just been fired and Marvin Lewis appeared to need the help in the wake of firing defensive coordinator Teryl Austin in an effort to turn around a historically bad unit.
But as it turns out, the move transcended football, as captured by Sports Illustrated’s Greg Bishop:
Jackson sees it differently. He was depressed, his wife was worried about him and his best friend did him a solid. “I needed that jolt,” he says. “[Marvin] helped me. What he did wasn’t about football. I don’t know what would have happened had he not.”
Lost in the noise around Jackson at the time on and off the field as he went through a post-firing interview tour was his battle with depression over the loss of two loved ones, something chronicled in the feature from Bishop.
From a Bengals perspective, it’s nice to view the situation through a different angle, and a more important one — the human angle. Lewis was helping a friend, yes, but in ways only those close to them could understand.
Right now, neither Lewis or Jackson have NFL positions. The former is with Arizona State and the latter focusing on his family.
