Why Raleigh’s Dave Merritt, the Kansas City Chiefs’ “old ball coach,” is so beloved
The players call him “old ball coach.” To the rest of the football world he’s Dave Merritt, who has won five Super Bowls as a defensive backs coach and will lead his Kansas City Chiefs players against the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday in Super Bowl 59.
The journey for a chance at his sixth ring started back in Raleigh.
The youngest of nine kids, Merritt played football at Millbrook High School. When he was deciding on what school to attend, it came down to which school wanted him to play defense.
“So when North Carolina and North Carolina State offered me scholarships, I’m sitting here and I’m saying to myself, when UNC wanted me as a running back, fullback, NC State wanted me as a linebacker,” Merritt said. “I said, you know what, I’d rather hit than be hit, so therefore I went to NC State.”
After his college days, Merritt was drafted in the seventh round of the 1993 Draft to the Miami Dolphins and had a four-year playing career as a linebacker in the NFL. His playing days helped earn him a spot in the Millbrook High School inaugural Hall of Fame class in 2012. Then he went into coaching and 28 years later, he’s never looked back.
Merritt started with the New York Jets in 2001 before going to the New York Giants as a defensive assistant and quality control coach in 2004. There, he went on to capture his first two Super Bowl rings. In 2018, he became the Arizona Cardinals’ defensive backs coach before joining the Chiefs in the same role a year later.
Since joining Kansas City, Merritt has added three more Super Bowl rings to his collection and hopes to add another one Sunday night.
He’s familiar with the week leading up to the Super Bowl, and still enjoys it every time.
“This is number seven, and I’m sitting here, and I’m so excited for the guys that have had a chance to experience this,” Merritt said. “To come in and experience it, you know, I’ve had my time — now [it’s time] to see other guys fulfill their dreams. We have a lot of new guys that have never won a ring before, and so to be able to come in and have a chance to do that, and then to have it come to fruition, come Sunday night, I mean, that’s what it’s all about.”
Merritt has helped the young defensive backs develop as football players and as human beings. Before every meeting, he takes them through routines that include meditation exercises and reading the Bible, relating passages to what is going on in their lives.
“I think he’s the first coach that has taught so much about faith, taught us so much about how to be a better man,” Chiefs cornerback Trent McDuffie said. “One of those coaches that before we even start meetings, he truly talks to us about how to elevate your lives. Yeah he wants to make you a better player, but he genuinely wants to see you as a better man, better father, better son, and to me, I’ve been grateful for that.”
He often starts meetings with motivational quotes to hype the players. One comes from Muhammad Ali: “If my mind can conceive it and my heart can believe it, then I can achieve it.”
Regardless of the week or the opponent, Merritt always brings the energy.
“He always has high energy,” Chiefs linebacker Joshua Uche said “Some of the quotes he puts up on the screen before a meeting is always motivational and when he gets up there to talk, he always talks about the importance of time.”
This weekend, Merritt has the chance to join the club of NFL coaches to have six rings.
Even though he is far from his N.C. roots, the community support is evident. Winning Super Bowl after Super Bowl doesn’t just mean something to Merritt and his family — it has significance for so many more.
“It means a lot when I know that people back there who knew me from when I was a grasshopper, you know, that’s a special thing, and so I want to make them proud, and I want to continue to bring them championships, because it’s for all of us,” Merritt said. “When I win, they win, and so it’s a community effort.”
Anna Laible is a student with UNC Media Hub, a program with the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media, reporting from the Super Bowl in New Orleans. Laible hosts the Speak Up Sports Podcast. Follow her journey covering her first Super Bowl on her Instagram (@anna_laible).