Bengals' Zimmer puts grieving period on hold

CINCINNATI – If you have even the smallest droplet of empathy in your soul, the tiniest bit of sympathy, you are cheering for the Cincinnati Bengals to keep playing.

In fact, if it's at all possible, the Bengals should get to keep playing ad infinitum. Anything to keep defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer working each week, delaying the inevitable moment when there are no more tapes to break down, no more game plans to draw up and no more practices at which to go into profanity-laced tirades that leave his players chuckling under their breath.

Anything to keep him from one of those down moments, such as during a plane ride to a road game, when his thoughts drifted to his late wife, Vikki.

"I shut my eyes to get a nap and all I could do was see my wife and how I found her," Zimmer said, referring to Oct. 8, when he discovered his wife dead of an undisclosed cause at their home. "Some times are worse than others. I have a picture in my phone … every time I opened the phone or turned it on, the picture would show up.

"This may sound bad … I left the picture on [the phone], but I had to put it in another place. I couldn't have it that every time I opened the phone, I was reminded of her. I don't know if that makes sense."

Zimmer talks about Vikki in a polite, matter-of-fact way bordering on clinical. He's not trying to avoid the subject. At the same time, he admits that he has yet to really deal with her death during the past three months. He took one day off and worries mostly about his two young-adult daughters, Marki and Corri. He keeps his phone on him at all times, even at practice, to make sure he can text back and forth with his girls, if necessary.

As for the rest of the emotions, he has put them on hold.

"I talk to a doctor friend who was with us in Dallas. I talk to her almost daily, text message or something, and she's kind of leading me to that point that when the season gets over, [I'm] going to need to have things to occupy [my] time," said Zimmer, who's in his second year with the Bengals. "I haven't gotten to that point, but I'm preparing for life after [the season is over]."

For now, the demanding hours of a coach are his therapy, his escape. On Sunday, he'll find relative comfort in trying to help Cincinnati beat the New York Jets in the first round of the playoffs.

Zimmer has played a significant role in the Bengals going further than anyone expected at the beginning of the season. Armed with many castoffs and a sprinkling of top draft picks, Zimmer's demanding and exacting style helped the Bengals give up the sixth-fewest points (18.2 per game) and fourth-fewest yards (301.4) this season.

How Zimmer did that is pretty obvious to everyone. He is a master of preparation, profanely demanding in his attention to detail and, just as important, capable of translating that to game day.

"When I brought him in for an interview – it wasn't really even an interview, it was more of a discussion – the one thing he said is, 'Don't worry, I'll call a good game for you,' " Cincinnati coach Marvin Lewis said. "That's not as easy as it sounds. A lot of guys can draw it up, talk about it all day, but when it comes to game day, it doesn't always happen. Zim can dial it up on game day."

He can also dial it up in practices and meetings. To a man, Bengals players smile and laugh at Zimmer's barrage of expletives. Wide receiver Chad Ochocinco(notes) compared Zimmer to comedian Andrew Dice Clay during practices.

"Get this stupid mother-[expletive, expletive, expletive] off this mother-[expletive] field," Ochocinco said. "The offensive guys just sit there and laugh when he gets like that, chewing out his guys."

Said cornerback Johnathan Joseph(notes): "He'll set you up if you're not paying attention. We'll be in the meeting and he'll have said something. Then he'll notice some guy not paying attention and ask him a question that all of us know the answer to. The guy will screw it up and Zim will go, 'What the beep are you doing?' "

At the same time, the players don't seem to take it personally. Further, they don't take his direct, pointed and honest appraisals of what they can or can't do the wrong way.

"Zim is going to tell you like it is," said defensive tackle Tank Johnson(notes), who has played for Lovie Smith and Wade Phillips but deems Zimmer the best defensive coach he has been around. "He's going to tell you: 'This and this and this is what you do well. This is how you're going to survive in the NFL.' You may not always agree, but you know what the man thinks and you know he's saying it because he wants to help you. If you listen to him, it's going to work."

Such as the game earlier this season when Johnson was having problems running a certain move. He came to the sideline and told Zimmer the move wasn't working. Zimmer wasn't going to hear it.

"He said, 'Run it the way I told you to, [expletive] run it and it'll work,' and he was right. I did it his way and we stopped them," Johnson said.

In conversation, Zimmer is as mild-mannered as a Starbucks cashier. He's almost embarrassed about his tirades, but admits that's who he is when he's around the players.

"I preface it by telling them … 'If I get after you, it's not because I don't like you, it's because I do like you, because I am trying to make you better.' A lot of the time, I wish it wasn't like that. [But] it is what I am and I think it has hurt me somewhat in my career advancement," Zimmer acknowledged. "Football players are basically tough guys, they play the game tough and I think they want to be coached tough. I think it breeds toughness on your side of the ball within your team. It's more about the image of our guys than the words I use.

"Now, around my daughters, when my wife was alive, I never talked like that. I'm only that way in this building, around these guys."

That leads back to the humanistic question of how Zimmer has done this.

"I told him directly, 'I don't know how you do it,' " Cincinnati defensive line coach Jay Hayes said. "I think about if that happened to me, I'd be a mess. I don't know what I'd do."

Bengals offensive coordinator Bob Bratkowski has known Zimmer and his late wife for nearly 30 years. Bratkowski and his wife attended the Zimmers' wedding when they were both college assistants more than 20 years ago.

Zimmer is not shy about showing emotions … on the field.
(Frank Victores/US Presswire)

"We've had a lot of private conversations in the past three months that I'm not going to get into, but I can't even imagine how I'd handle it," Bratkowski said. "Probably not this way."

Zimmer, the son of a former NFL player (Bill) and the father of an NFL assistant coach (Adam Zimmer works for the New Orleans Saints), said he knows no other way.

"I don't know what else to do. This is all I know to do right now, to go coach, go do what I do. Honestly, I think it's good therapy for me because I'm so worried about my daughters and making sure they're OK – and my son to a certain extent, although I think he's OK. He's older and not as emotional," Zimmer said. "I think it would be worse if I sat home and watched TV or read books. I'd really lose touch because I'm pretty much to myself anyway.

"[The doctor] said, 'I understand that, but somebody has to take care of you at a certain point.' I know I need time to grieve, but it's more important for me to worry about [my family]. What am I going to do? I told somebody this a while back, the world doesn't stop. Yeah, what happened to my wife is important. I think I'm important. But the thing you notice is that the world keeps going. People feel bad for you, but they go on with their lives and do the things they normally do every day. It opened my eyes to how important we all are and how much the world needs us. Everything goes on.

"I get letters that say, 'Hey, you're an inspiration.' I'm not doing it to be an inspiration to other people. I wish I could say that. I'm doing it for selfish reasons. This is what I do."