COSTA MESA, Calif. -- Coaches love to extoll the virtues of their profession, calling it a "small fraternity." They meet at the combine, individual workouts, college workouts, meetings, workouts called by agents and various clinics. They get close and rarely forget something they learned from someone else.
Los Angeles Chargers coach Brandon Staley is insistent his coaching "tree" is his father, Bruce, and his late mother, Linda, who died of breast cancer after a nine-year-battle, but there is much more. Staley is smack in the middle of developing his own tree, one that spans from his playing days at Division II Mercyhurst University to his rapid ascent through the NFL coaching ranks.