MovieChat Forums > Draft Day (2014) Discussion > Dennis Leary as Head Coach

Dennis Leary as Head Coach

posted 10 years ago by ANGRYal
8 replies | jump to latest

By and large, I like Dennis Leary.
But as far as being cast as a head football coach, it ain't happenin' for me. It's like Al Pacino as head coach in "Any Given Sunday,".... bad casting. I don't know what quality they saw in Leary that convinced them he could pull off presenting himself as an NFL head coach, but it seemed like a mistake. There's a certain quality in the personality of a football coach that both Leary and Pacino just don't have.

[–] lemner 10 years ago

I was surprised at his role, because I would have expected more gravitas or physical size for a coach.

Semper Contendere Propter Amoram et Formam


[–] dyingearth 10 years ago

Not really. It's not about the size of the man, but the kind of arrogance confidence the coach projects. It's not always clear from films, but Vince Lombardi was physically not a large man, mostly dwarfed by the rest of his players. But he dominated them by the force of his will, and his many championship.

[–] HowYaLikeDemApplesWill 9 years ago

They needed a dickhead antagonist to go head-to-head with Costner - when casting calls for a dickhead, who better than Leary?

Whose idea was it for the word "Lisp" to have an "S" in it?

[–] joestl 9 years ago

I wouldn't say he's not a believable coach just because he's not that big of a guy, how big of a person is Jon Gruden?

[–] duelgunnz 9 years ago

I think we can all agree that Leary stole his entire stand up persona and much of his routines from the late, great, Bill Hicks. This alone should rule him out from portraying a head NFL coach.

[–] joestl 9 years ago

Not sure what his standup routine has any bearing on his ability to act as an NFL coach. If you don't like his standup act then just don't watch his standup act.

[–] toddchavez 9 years ago

No, he stole his routines. The persona's are pretty different. I mean, first of all, Bill talks more slowly and is more sardonic and tired while Denis is more angry, hyper, and energetic. The only similarities their stand-up personas have is that they like to smoke, wear leather jackets, and hate the world. So, in other words, they pretty much stole their personas from the cast of Grease.

[–] BrotherZed 9 years ago

I wouldn't say he's not a believable coach just because he's not that big of a guy, how big of a person is Jon Gruden?

About 5'9" to 5'10". I met him several times when he coached the Bucs, he was a few inches shorter than me. Tony Dungy was right at 6' tall, he was maybe an inch shorter than me.

As the others said, you don't have to be huge to be a coach. Even the coaches who were former players aren't necessarily big. A fair bit of them were DB's from 30 years ago, like Dungy, and tend to be on the smaller side.

The most important part about being a coach is between the ears. You have to have the smarts and charisma to develop a plan, implement it and get 60 guys on board with it. That's it, your bench press is irrelevant.