Why do Chuck Pagano's players love him

"It doesn matter if you a practice squad player or whatever. . He going to treat you the same way," Jerrell Freeman says of coach Chuck Pagano. "He loves us all equally." Here, Pagano congratulated Freeman and others on the defense in a game against the Chiefs in 2013.(Photo: Matt Kryger / The Star)He could take bows over being the second coach in NFL history to record 11 wins in his first three seasons. And he'd be justified puffing his chest out about his 2 2 postseason record and two trips to the second round of the playoffs.

Instead, Indianapolis Colts coach Chuck Pagano does none of the above. He keeps deflecting the credit, lauding the star quarterback, showering praise on his assistants.

But ask around the Colts' locker room and you come to understand the true value of Pagano and why he is a major reason the Colts are in the AFC Divisional Playoffs.

Ask Darius Butler about his younger brother's heartfelt conversations with Pagano about their respective battles with Suede Mrs Baba 100mm cancer. Ask Jerrell Freeman about how Pagano showed faith in him when he still was an unknown player from the Canadian Football League. "He's why we're here. I've been in locker rooms where guys don't get along with their head coach. But Coach P is such a down to earth guy, he's an integrity guy. We really love playing for him."

If you don't think that matters, just take a trip back in time, back to when Pagano took over a team coming off a 2 14 season, in early 2012. He reminisced this week about the first offseason team meeting he held, in a half empty room, and how he had to give his players something to hold on to. He couldn't sell success, because it likely seemed too far away.

So, Pagano sold himself instead.

"There were about 25 players in there," Pagano said, reflecting. "There were a lot of great players, great Colts players, including (Peyton Manning) that were no longer there in the very first team meeting I ever had. We had people from all over the place that were new in that room.

"If you've been around the game long enough, you know it's not always the most talented teams that win it all," Butler said. "It's such a team sport that you have to buy into something. You have to be all in for it to work. If you go out there with your own agenda, it's not really going to work. You have to have each other's backs out there. We do."

Butler makes a case in point that might seem a small example to others, but is anything but that to Purple Suede Mrs Baba 100mm him. His younger brother, Stormy, has a great story. Black Suede Pigalle Botta 120mm Overcame a rare form of skin cancer to continue his football career at West Texas A He's an inspiration. Pagano, who beat leukemia in 2012, is one as well, and he wanted to know Stormy's Black Strass Pigalle Botta 120mm story. So, before a game, the two met, shared and celebrated their cancer free status.

"It was something he didn't have to do," Darius Butler said. "But it made a huge impression. I'm sure only certain people can relate to that people who have been through it."