Leap from college coaching to NFL rarely worth the trip

[...] if the end game is to win a Super Bowl, candidates applying for NFL head-coaching vacancies may want to downplay their college resumes.

There's three-time (in a 6-year span) national championship winner Nick Saban, who was 15-17 in the NFL and desperate enough to depart the Miami Dolphins that he lied several times about chasing the Alabama job he eventually latched onto.

[...] there's Steve Spurrier, Dennis Erickson, Lou Holtz, Butch Davis, Bobby Petrino, Rich Brooks, Frank Kush and even Oklahoma Sooner legend Bud Wilkinson, whose flirtation with the NFL was fairly typical.

After amassing three national championships and a 47-game winning streak a record that still stands, Wilkinson came out of retirement for the St. Louis Cardinals job, went 9-20 over parts of two seasons and quit with three games remaining in his third.

Some never adjust to the different schemes, much-faster pace of play, or the differences required to motivate highly-paid pros instead of kids dependent on scholarships.

After a 3-10 start there, and a locker-room mutiny gaining steam, Petrino bailed on the NFL and let his team in on the news by posting a note in the locker room.

[...] Carroll hit his stride at USC, and NCAA investigators were hot on his trail when he lit out for a third NFL audition in Seattle.

After two seasons and a 12-20 record, he left Washington with most of the outlandish 5-year, $25 million contract he arm-wrestled owner Dan Snyder for and went back to the college ranks at South Carolina.

Holtz never got used to having players who didn't follow his every command and resigned from the Jets with one game remaining that season, not long after calling a sports department in the New York metro area and asking whether anybody there had a phone number for his quarterback, Joe Namath.