Colorado’s coaching staff is star-studded, littered with pros up and down the sideline. Many are lauded for their expertise and their experience, with plenty of CU players citing the NFL pedigree of the Buffs’ staff as a reason they wanted to play in Boulder.
New graduate assistant Warren Sapp is certainly no exception, but his contribution to the Buffs’ defensive line doesn’t come solely in the form of experience or technique. The Pro Football Hall-of-Famer is bringing a constant positive energy to practice and has found an affinity for coaching that he didn’t expect.
“For someone that never wanted to do this, I’m addicted to it right now,” Sapp said. “The babies are really giving me a purpose in life and I’m enjoying it.”
Sapp came to CU with no official coaching experience, though he did spend some time with the Washington Commanders last summer, and now starts his career on the sidelines 17 years after retiring from the NFL. His first camp is full of learning – about how the game has changed, how to manage the guys in the room and how to balance being a “fun guy”, in his words, with getting the best out of his group.
He’s not the man in charge of the defensive linemen, however. That title belongs to new defensive line coach Damione Lewis, another former NFL veteran who has coached the Seattle Seahawks defensive linemen since 2020. Sapp, always one of the stars as a player, is making the adjustment to taking a little bit of a backseat in his new role.
“This is the first time I’m going for a championship and I’m not leading,” Sapp said. “That’s a beautiful thing, that now I have to relinquish the wheel and let somebody else drive. It’s a beautiful thing to watch my kids, day in and day out, get a little better …
“The best part about it is I’m learning every day. They’re teaching me too, because the game ain’t the same. It’s a different game. The way I played, you can’t play it like that anymore. So we’re just mixing and matching and doing it the right way. It’s 21st century football, so I’m learning, they’re learning and we’re gonna learn together.”
Sapp and Lewis have a mutual respect for each other that goes back almost three decades. After Sapp’s illustrious career at Miami ended, Lewis showed up on campus and carved out a strong Hurricanes legacy himself. They were both selected with the 12th overall pick — in the 1995 and 2001 NFL Drafts, respectively.
“From the beginning, he came behind me at Miami,” Sapp said of the Buffs’ new defensive line coach. “He’s one of those guys that was the next baby Sapp. So he’s been trying to beat me his whole life. So now we’re putting it together and seeing if we can turn them into something that’s better than both of us. So we have a great push-pull relationship, see the game the same way, and just love him. You got a guy that loves the game, we’re gonna do this thing.”
Sapp and Lewis have worked hard to bring the energy at practice, and now they’re working on converting that to the game field when the Buffs kick off against North Dakota State. One thing that the two coaches’ experience has taught them is that they must build a foundation first, something that the 2023 Buffs severely lacked.
Too often, the 2023 Colorado team got gashed in the run game, fooled by misdirection and caught out of position, and it put the rest of the defense behind the 8-ball. Sapp knows that if the Buffs want to compete in a deep Big 12, that is a trend that cannot continue.
“The one thing that I did see last year before I turned the TV off was we couldn’t stop the run and that won’t happen again,” Sapp said. “No, we’re gonna earn our right to rush by stopping the run.”
“We’re gonna pull concrete. We’re gonna make sure we’re fundamentally sound in our gaps, in our hands, in our feet and trust in our eyes. That’s the most beautiful thing with the D-line position: offensive linemen don’t lie.”
The point being — once you have a foundation that can get you on even footing, then you can begin to set a tone as a defense. That will be the goal for the Buffs, who turned over their staff and personnel alike on the defensive side in hopes that they can become a defense that imposes their will on opponents. As opening night moves closer, Sapp is doing his part to impose that mindset on the defensive line
“We need a unit and a pack to go hunt,” Sapp said. “If a bunch of wild dogs show up in your neighborhood, nobody’s coming outside. That’s what I’m telling them. We’ve just gotta show up like a bunch of wild dogs to the stadium and we’re gonna hunt. The table is set. Let’s eat.”
