John Robinson (football coach)

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John Robinson
Date of birth	July 25, 1935 (1935-07-25) (age 72)
Place of birth	Chicago, Illinois
Position(s)	End
College	Oregon
Career Record	79-74
Coaching Stats	Pro Football Reference
Coaching Stats	DatabaseFootball
Team(s) as a coach/administrator
1983-1991 1976-1982, 1993-1997 1999-2004	Los Angeles Rams Southern California UNLV

John Alexander Robinson (born July 25, 1935 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American football coach best known for his two stints as head coach of the University of Southern California (USC) football team and for his tenure as head coach of the Los Angeles Rams, a National Football League football team. His USC teams won four Rose Bowls, and captured a share of the 1978 national championship.

[edit] Early life and playing career

Robinson grew up in San Mateo, California, where he attended elementary school with future Pro Football Hall of Famer John Madden, and graduated from Junípero Serra High School. He attended the University of Oregon, where he played end on Oregon's 1957 Rose Bowl team.

[edit] Coaching career

He began his coaching career at the University of Oregon, his alma mater, where he served as an assistant coach under Len Casanova and Jerry Frei from 1960-1971. He served as USC's offensive coordinator in 1972 under John McKay, who had been an assistant coach at Oregon when Robinson played there, then served a stint as the Oakland Raiders' backfield coach in 1975, rejoining Madden, who was by then Oakland's head coach. Robinson coached at USC from 1976-1982 and again from 1993-1997, putting up a career record as a college head coach of 104-35-4, for a winning percentage of .741.

Robinson is considered one of the more successful coaches in Rams history, twice leading the team to the NFC title game. Both of those contests ended in defeat against eventual Super Bowl champions, the 1985 Chicago Bears and the 1989 San Francisco 49ers. Robinson's tenure as Rams coach was made more difficult by the fact that the Rams played in the same division as the 49ers, the dominant team of the 1980s, but he was also the coach who drafted running back Eric Dickerson.

Robinson was hired to coach football at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in 1998. In 2002 he was chosen as the university's athletic director, but he stepped down from that position a year later to concentrate on the coaching position. Despite being relieved of duty as athletic director, his tenure ended on a disappointing note with the Rebels going 2-9 in his final season in 2004.

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