Barry Shuck’s exclusive interview with former Browns QB Mike Pagel: Backing up Bernie, moving with Colts and more

Cleveland Browns v Pittsburgh Steelers — Photo by George Gojkovich/Getty Images

18 questions with a former Cleveland quarterback

Former Cleveland Browns quarterback Mike Pagel came to the franchise in a trade with the Indianapolis Colts in 1986. He had already played in 51 NFL games with 47 starts.

Yet when he arrived in Cleveland, he was penciled in as the #3 quarterback.

Bernie Kosar had just completed his rookie season and played in 12 games. Gary Danielson was the seasoned veteran hired to mentor Kosar after he came over in a trade with the Detroit Lions during the spring of 1985. He had started the early portion of the year before Kosar took over. Paul McDonald was entrenched as QB3. But Danielson had shoulder surgery and was the unknown of when he would return. The Browns needed a seasoned veteran behind the youngster, Kosar.

Pagel was drafted in the fourth round of the 1982 draft by the Baltimore Colts, then traded to the Browns and played from 1986 to 1990 before moving on to the Los Angeles Rams from 1991-1993. In his final year of pro football, Pagel played for the Massachusetts Marauders of the Arena Football League, where the team went 8-4-0, won a playoff game, and then lost 51-42 to Orlando in the semifinals. Pagel threw 46 touchdowns against 14 picks.

Pagel, who competed at 6’-2”, 206 pounds, played in 132 NFL games with 54 starts, compiled 9,414 career passing yards, 1,509 passing attempts with 756 completions, tossed 49 touchdowns, 63 interceptions, had a 50.1% completion ratio, and a career 63.3 QB rating. He was sacked 115 times. He also rushed 136 times for 831 yards with an additional four scores.

In the 1986 preseason, he broke his ankle and was ruled out for the entire season. For his career, Pagel had six fourth-quarter comebacks and eight game-winning drives, including the 23-17 victory over the Minnesota Vikings with Cleveland on December 17, 1989.

With Kosar sidelined by injury in 1988, Pagel completed 17 of 25 passes with two touchdowns and an interception in a 24-23 Wild Card home playoff loss to the Houston Oilers after the Browns finished the regular season 10-6-0.

After he hung up his cleats, Pagel became a senior project manager for AT&T, worked as an analyst for FSN Ohio’s high school football telecasts and various college games, and for the Browns’ radio network, and coached high school football.

The football stadium at Pagel’s alma mater, Washington High School in Phoenix, is named after his family’s namesake, “Pagel Field.”

Pagel now lives in central North Carolina, directly between Charlotte and Raleigh, and has been married for 24 years to Lisa, with five older children. The couple are Christians.

Dawgs By Nature’s Barry Shuck was able to sit down with Pagel to discuss how he beat out a first-round draft pick while with the Colts, what was so special about Browns offensive coordinator Lindy Infante, and how the league is different now.

DBN: You played basketball, baseball, and football at Washington High School in Phoenix. At what point did you decide to pursue football going forward?

Pagel: I was starting to get recruited by the Naval Academy as a junior in football and wasn’t getting much action for baseball and basketball. In my senior year in high school, I got an appointment for the Naval Academy, but Arizona State head coach Frank Kush offered me a scholarship right after we won the state semi-final game. He was at the game and came down on the field afterwards. It came down to Arizona State or the Naval Academy. I felt more comfortable at ASU. But I continued to enjoy both baseball and basketball. Once football season was over, in my mind it shifted to basketball. We played in the state finals on Friday, and on Saturday, I dressed out for a basketball game.

DBN: Arizona Central made a list of the greatest Arizona high school quarterbacks of all time. You made the list. Care to guess where you are placed?

Pagel: I have no clue. I haven’t lived in Arizona since 1984 and don’t keep up with that. You obviously know. And any list would have Danny White at Number 1. And seeing that I am listed at #2 is a surprise. Any list is subjective, and what is the criterion? Based on what you did in high school or later in your career? How do you look at quarterbacks from totally different eras? It’s a great honor, and I appreciate it.

DBN: Week 7 of the 1981 season, Arizona State faced Stanford on the road. QB John Elway was a junior and already a Heisman candidate. You were underrated in a run-first offense. But that day, you broke two conference records: 466 passing yards in a single game and seven TD passes. The two teams also broke an NCAA record by having 1,436 yards in total offense, and the final score was 62-36 win. Yet, the halftime score was just a 27-24 lead. What was said in the locker room at the half that enabled your team to start throwing footballs like migrating ducks?

Pagel: We were throwing it in the first half. Let’s go back a week, though. We played Cal in that game. They ran the run-and-shoot, and our philosophy was we had to keep their offense off the field. We had 97 offensive plays and ran the ball 77 times and had the ball 43-plus minutes in that game. We ended up winning that game. The next week against Stanford, their front seven was tough up front, and mostly juniors and seniors, but their secondary was very young. They saw how much we ran the week before, and they geared up for the running game. That allowed us to have a lot of one-on-one coverage outside. It seemed to explode in the third quarter, and that’s when the score went up to 62.

DBN: In 1981, you beat out Stanford’s John Elway for First Team All-Pac 10 quarterback, tossing 29 TD passes, which, at the time, was the second-best effort in Arizona State history. Both you and Elway had name recognition, and of course, now he is in the Hall of Fame. Looking back, was that a huge accomplishment in your career?

Pagel: When you get acknowledged for what you’ve done, it’s always nice. But it wasn’t me against John Elway. It was me trying to be the best I could be using the tools that Arizona State had. Being named First Team quarterback was a great thrill. Was it me competing for that against Elway? No, not at all. We also competed in college baseball when I was an outfielder at Arizona State.

DBN: You were the fifth quarterback taken in the 1982 NFL draft and the first pick in Round 4 by the Baltimore Colts. Yet, the Colts chose QB Art Schlichter in Round 1 with the fourth overall pick of the same draft. Please explain that.

Pagel: Frank Kush was now the head coach at Baltimore that year. It was his first year as an NFL head coach, and he was the one who recruited me to college. Someone higher up wanted Art Schlichter because he was from Ohio State, had a national reputation, and was up for the Heisman a couple of years. I was basically the insurance policy. The day before the draft, the Colts had traded their starting quarterback, Bert Jones, to the LA Rams. We had Greg Landry, the veteran, and another veteran, David Humm, who was going into his eighth year, and they brought in us two rookie quarterbacks, which was kinda weird.

Editor’s note: The Baltimore Colts relocated to Indianapolis in 1984

DBN: Many media stories we found talk about how you outplayed Schlichter in training camp. Despite starting training camp as QB4, on opening day, it was you who started. David Humm and Schlichter finally played some in the final two games. The following year, going into training camp for 1983, were you confident that you would keep the starting QB job?

Pagel: Oh yeah. I was very confident. My rookie season was the players’ strike, which shortened the season to just nine games.

DBN: You were part of the franchise moving from Baltimore to Indianapolis. Did you just show up for practice and realize nobody was there?

Pagel: I got a call from a reporter in Baltimore the very next morning. I was back in Arizona at the time. He said, “Well, you’re not a Baltimore Colt anymore, you are an Indianapolis Colt.” It was a complete shock to me, even though after the first two seasons were over, I would drive from Baltimore to Arizona and would go right through Indianapolis, and I saw this huge building being built. Not knowing that would be my future home. As a player, there isn’t a whole lot you can do about that: we’ll just move to Indianapolis. One of the coaches was assigned to find housing opportunities for us. All of the coaches and front office people were assigned different roles, like finding doctors, schools, and stuff like car repair.

DBN: Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium was an old outdoor arena. What was it like going from an ancient place to play to now being inside a plush domed stadium?

Pagel: It was so different. When you played in Baltimore, it was an older stadium that had grass, but had dirt half the season because we shared it with the baseball Orioles and the infield was always there. Blue-collar fans. I loved playing there because I was the type of player that if I didn’t get dirty in the first couple of minutes, I didn’t feel right. Indianapolis had great people, but it was a basketball city. Football there was indoors, on turf, very clean, new, and a pretty place to play. And I was not a pretty player. It was awkward to me.

DBN: So, you just might be a Colts trivia question. “Name the last player to wear #18 for the Colts before Peyton Manning.” Your thoughts?

Pagel: Let me tell you a quick story about that. When I lived in Cleveland, I had three kids, and two sisters down the street were our babysitters. Years later, one of the sisters is now married with two kids of her own, and she comes to visit me in Arizona with her husband. I had my Colts #18 jersey framed on the wall. Her nine-year-old son is tugging on his dad’s pant leg. And finally, the dad looked down and asked what he wanted. The kid said, “Dad, that’s not how you spell ‘Manning.’

DBN: You were traded to the Browns in 1986. How did you find out?

Pagel: The Colts traded for QB Gary Hogeboom on a Monday, the draft was on Tuesday, and they took QB Jack Trudeau in the second round. On Wednesday, head coach Rod Dowhower called me into his office and said they were going to trade me. In a couple of weeks, I’m getting invited to do a workout in Cleveland and have breakfast with Marty Schottenheimer. A couple of days later, I get traded to Cleveland. I was notified that they were going to trade me, but I just didn’t know to which team or when.

DBN: What was that meal like with OC Lindy Infante and Marty?

Pagel: It was quite pleasant. That was in 1985. The Browns had made it to the playoffs as a Wild Card. Marty talked about his plans and where the team was heading, philosophies, and where they thought I would fit. It was more of an interview. Infante was a brilliant mind and had quite a different approach to Marty’s outlook, which was to run the ball all the time.

DBN: With the Colts, you had 47 starts in four years. Now you come to Cleveland, and they have first-round draft pick Bernie Kosar going into his second year, and he wasn’t going anywhere. With the Colts, you had chances to be the starter every year. Now, coming to Cleveland, you were traded specifically to be the seasoned backup. What was going through your head when you came to the Browns?

Pagel: That was the role they had for me, but my mindset was that I did not come to Cleveland to be the backup. Bernie was a first-round draft pick and was their future, and Gary Danielson, who had been in the league a number of years but was coming off shoulder surgery. Once again, I became the insurance policy. But Marty was not completely sold on Bernie as the starter because he was young and had only played one year. And it was Lindy’s first year with the offense, and he wasn’t sure how Bernie would fit. Halfway through training camp was when they decided to go with Bernie. I was not happy about it, but I buckled down, practiced each week like I was going to play, and was prepared for each game. If you get complacent as the backup, you are one step out the door.

DBN: The Browns’ head coach was Marty Schottenheimer, who was defensive-minded, but the offense was coached by Lindy Infante. What made his offensive scheme special?

Pagel: His offense was comfortable for me to play in. I loved Infante and loved his offensive scheme. In my first few years with the Colts, we would run most of the time. This was the type of offense where you learn the reads, you learn the progression, then you work on your footwork with all the different plays so that when that play is called, you’re working your feet so that you are ready to throw to whichever is the first guy who is open in your progression. It was just of matter of physical work because the mental part was never that complicated. For me, the physical part was the hardest. I grew up with a dad who was a football and baseball coach. So, understanding offensive concepts was never that difficult for me. Making it work with the footwork was the bigger challenge. It was a very simple offense.

DBN: In Week 15 of the 1989 season, the opponent was the Minnesota Vikings in a home game. Wind chill was minus 15. Five lead changes with the Browns down by three in the fourth quarter until Matt Bahr hit a 32-yard field goal, and the game went into overtime. Bernie Kosar was the starting QB and had thrown two touchdowns in the game. In overtime, Cleveland drives on a 39-yard gain by Reggie Langhorne from Kosar. On third down, Bahr lined up to kick the field goal with you as the holder, but it was a fake. Tell me about that final play.

Pagel: First of all, I had to be ready to play. One play of injury and I would be in. So, I have to keep myself loose the whole game. It’s pretty easy if you are on the sidelines down in Miami or somewhere that played indoors. In Cleveland with the wind chill at 10 below, it’s hard. If you just stand around, you get stiff pretty quickly, so you have to bounce around. I never stood still for very long. Call it pacing. I did not get a chance to get up and start throwing because that would have given it away that we were going with a fake. So, I did not throw a single pass on the sideline before that play. I came in like I always did as the holder, took the snap from center, Matt came like he was going to boot it, I got up, spun around, and Van Waiters, who was a linebacker but had reported as eligible from the tight end spot, was open. One pass, one touchdown.

DBN: After your NFL career, you were the quarterback coach at Normandy High School in Parma, Ohio. How long did you do that?

Pagel: Two years. I actually started at Gilmore Academy for one season and then applied for the head coaching job there. My kids were graduating high school in 2009, and I wanted to stay in the game and keep coaching. The guy they hired asked if I wanted to become the offensive coordinator, and I accepted. But Gilmore played most of their games on Saturday, and I wanted those days to go watch my son play at Bowling Green. Which is when I switched to Normandy and coached for two years there. Coaching is such a time commitment. At some point, I realized that I couldn’t coach to the level I wanted to because I was also working at AT&T for 15 years.

DBN: Washington High School in Phoenix named their football field “Pagel Field.” You played in the NFL and had four brothers who played sports, plus your dad was a coach. Is that stadium named after you?

Pagel: It’s actually named after my mom and dad. My dad, Tom, coached and taught at Washington. And they were going to name it after my dad, and he said, no, it’s got to be named after my mother Rose, also. They had a Pagel enrolled in that high school in every semester from the fall of 1969 through the spring of 1980. All five of us played three sports there, and all of us played at least two years of college football. And three of us played at least two years of college baseball. My dad is now 95 years old, while my mom passed 15 years ago.

DBN: Other than money, how is the NFL different today than when you played?

Pagel: For one, it’s gone from a smash mouth, stop the run first game, to a much wider open and let your athletes get out in space of a game. It’s much more explosive now. They go out and get athletes, turn them loose, and let them do what they do best. Not that we didn’t have athletes when I played, but there is a difference, and the players have gotten bigger. Look at the shoulder pads that the linemen and linebackers use today. Thigh pads and knee pads were very predominant when we played, and now they slide them up and are almost non-existence because of speed instead of protection. You see the bare knee of every punter and kick returner. When I played, they had rules where you couldn’t have skin showing there.

DBN: What is your fondest moment of being a Cleveland Brown?

Pagel: There are a lot of those. Getting to play in three AFC Championship Games was a thrill. The 1988 Wild Card playoff game, where I got to substitute in for Don Strock against Houston after being on injured reserve for 10 weeks. Unfortunately, we lost, but I got to play in a playoff game. My first start for the Browns was memorable in 1988, my third year there. We had not scored a touchdown in the first two games, and I started in Week 3 on Monday Night Football at home against the Colts, my former team. I hit Ozzie Newsome in the back of the end zone on a great catch on the opening drive and the first touchdown scored by our offense all season. And then, you could feel the whole stadium – relax. It was like the entire stadium said, “Okay, we got a chance.” Nobody knew what I could do because I was stuck as the backup and had never actually played for the Browns yet. Bernie got hurt, Gary was hurt, and it was like damn it! After that touchdown, not only did the stadium relax, but the entire Browns team did, too. Okay, cool, this guy can play. Maybe not the superstar that we would like to have, but he keeps us in ballgames.