Former Redskin Jacoby savors new role

WINCHESTER, Va.

Joe Jacoby is 49, but he probably could still line up and lay somebody flat, just like he did during his 13 years as an offensive tackle for the Washington Redskins. At 6-foot-7 and his playing weight of 320 pounds, he still looks intimidating. But to get his point across in his new job as a volunteer assistant coach at Shenandoah University, Jacoby applies a subtle motivational touch - a roll of tape.

“He’s threatened us with the tape a couple of times,” sophomore tackle Jonathan Doering said.

Added junior guard Sean McKenzie: “He tells us that in pass protection or run blocking, if we don’t keep our hands up, we’re gonna lose our base. It’s gonna mess everything up. We’re gonna fall down. Coach Jacoby had this great idea of bringing out some tape. If we don’t want to use [our hands], we can tape ‘em to our sides.”

Jacoby, who earned four Pro Bowl selections with the Redskins from 1981 to 1993, is a technician, a stickler for details. It’s how he made the team as an undrafted free agent out of Louisville. It’s how he became a charter member of the Hogs, the moniker for the Redskins’ offensive line during the team’s glory days (1983 NFC Championship, wins in Super Bowls XVII, XXII, XXVI).

He used his size and strength to bulldoze opponents, but he can’t coach that at Shenandoah, where everything football-related is scaled down - including the players. Jacoby dwarfs them all. In big-time college programs, there are large, expensive buildings with opulent players’ lounges and cavernous weight rooms, jock dorms and high-tech study halls and enough video equipment to start a cable network.

This isn’t the big time.

Shenandoah, a private school of about 3,000 students located about 55 miles west of the District, competes at the NCAA Division III level. It has fielded a football team as a four-year institution only since 2000. Nestled in the scenic Shenandoah Valley, it’s where players gather in the coach’s tiny office to watch tape on a single laptop and where everyone, coaches included, lugs equipment to a practice field that’s wedged between a parking lot and Interstate 81. The goal posts are on wheels.

For Joe Jacoby, a rookie coach in full, midlife career-change mode, the setting is perfect.

“Don’t get me wrong, I loved playing,” he said. “And running my business, I had fun doing that. But I’m getting so much enjoyment out of what I’m doing here, working with these young guys.”

Jacoby sold his Northern Virginia car dealerships (which still bear his name) and gave up his longtime Redskins postgame radio show to coach. Every day, except when he attends his weekly Bible study class, he leaves his Vienna home at 6:45 a.m. for the drive that takes a little more than an hour. He usually gets home at about 8 p.m.

Despite his appearance, Jacoby was a soft-spoken, cerebral player who studied film meticulously and mentored younger linemen like two-time Pro Bowl guard Mark Schlereth.

“He has so much knowledge to impart,” said Schlereth, who played for the Redskins from 1989 to 1994. “Just because he’s built like a big, giant caveman doesn’t mean he’s not intelligent. He was a very astute football player who knew defenses.”

Jacoby always itched to apply his knowledge to coaching. He did it once about 15 years ago at a high school but never actively pursued it. Now, with one daughter at the University of Miami on a swimming scholarship, and another daughter in high school and also a swimmer, the time seemed right.

He also realized there was more to life than selling cars.

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