Finance to Football: Robert Saleh's Story of Pursuing His Passion to Becoming an NFL Head Coach

Sourdough Sam

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Mar 20, 2019
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Saleh knew he wasn't being fulfilled, though. The money was great, sure, but life as a corporate lender didn't provide much else for a 22-year-old fresh into the workforce. Saleh recalled how his father, Sam, faced a similar conundrum back in his youth. Sam played college football at Eastern Michigan and received an offer to join the school's coaching staff following graduation. Instead, Sam went back to Dearborn to join the family business. It's a decision that paid off financially, but Saleh shared that his father always felt a degree of regret for not pursuing coaching as a career.


Saleh felt the urges, but it wasn't until two planes brought down the World Trade Center that he decided to forgo the sure thing and take a leap of faith to pursue his passion. Saleh's brother was in the second tower on Sept. 11, 2001. Fortunately, he made it to safety before the building collapsed. Even so, one of the darkest days in American history provided a stark reminder that life can be fleeting. Saleh ditched finance for football just a few months later.


He spent two seasons from 2002-03 at Michigan State as a graduate assistant while getting his masters in kinesiology. Saleh then made the 66-mile drive north from East Lansing, Mich., to Mt. Pleasant, Mich. He sat outside the Central Michigan football offices for an hour and a half until head coach Brian Kelly arrived.


The two had crossed paths before. Kelly recruited Saleh out of high school to come play at Grand Valley State. That familiarity helped Saleh land a graduate assistant role under Kelly in 2004. Saleh made a few valuable connections during his time with the Chippewas. The first was former 49ers left tackle Joe Staley, who was in the middle of a transition from tight end to tackle. The second, and more important at the time, was Tony Oden. Oden was only at CMU for a month before jettisoning off to the NFL with the Houston Texans. But he and Saleh became fast friends and kept in touch.


Saleh's next move, albeit a brief one, was to Georgia in 2005. That's because a month into his time in Athens, Ga., Oden came calling with an opportunity in Houston. Saleh broke into the NFL with the Texans in the summer of 2005. He joined Houston's coaching staff as a coaching intern and made a whopping $5 an hour. That was beaucoup bucks as far as Saleh was concerned, because $5 an hour turned into $7.50 an hour with overtime. And at 110 hours per week? That came out to around $25,000 annually ($2,083 per month). That's Bill Gates-type dough compared to the $600 a month he made at Michigan State, $800 a month at Central Michigan and $900 a month at Georgia.


"I thought I was loaded," Saleh joked. "I was rolling in it."
 
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