- Slug: Sports-Coach Taylor,550 words
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By JOHN ALVARADO
Cronkite News
GILBERT – Ever since he was a young boy growing up in Chandler, former Arizona State and Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Kerry Taylor dreamed of one day being a football coach.
“I was always was the kid in class drawing up plays,” Taylor said. “And, I fell in love with scheming and game planning against defenses.”
In the fall, Taylor will have plenty of opportunity to live out that dream when he begins two different coaching jobs.
In January, Taylor was named the wide receivers coach and passing game coordinator at Phoenix College. Last month, he became the head coach at Salt River High School in Scottsdale.
“It’s going to be a lot of work, a lot of long days, but a lot of great on-the-field football and teaching high school guys as well as college players,” Taylor said.
Taylor played at ASU from 2007 to 2010. He averaged 12.8 yards per catch and in his senior year he led the team in receiving with 699 yards. It was during his time at Arizona State that he reunited with his childhood friend Aaron Pflugrad, who transferred from Oregon to ASU and joined Taylor in the Sun Devils’ receiving corps.
The two first met when they were 8-year-old teammates in the Southeast Valley Youth Football program. Taylor would join Pflugrad at ASU football games while Aaron’s father, Robin, was the wide receivers coach and recruiting coordinator.
This fall, Taylor will work alongside Robin at Phoenix College, where Robin is assistant head coach. Robin said he saw potential in Taylor when his soon-to-be colleague was a young boy playing football with him and Aaron in their backyard in the East Valley.
“He was coachable and he listened,” Robin said. “He would go and do what you told him to do.”
The Taylor family tree is rich with football talent.
Kerry’s father, Keith, spent eight years in the NFL as a safety, beginning his career as a fifth-round selection of the Indianapolis Colts in 1988. After his playing career, the elder Taylor coached Kerry and Aaron in the Southeast Valley Youth Football program.
Kerry’s uncle, John Taylor, won three Super Bowl rings in his nine-year career with the San Francisco 49ers. A third-round pick in the 1986 NFL Draft, he made the game-winning touchdown catch in Super Bowl XXIII.
Aaron Pflugrad, now the wide receivers coach at Northern Arizona University, said Taylor started to become more knowledgeable in football when he switched from running back to wide receiver during their Pop Warner days.
“Not only was he a good player, but also a really bright player that picked things up really well,” Pflugrad said. “I could see that he would be a good coach because of how easily he understood the game and was able to pick it up at a really fast rate.”
When Aaron joined his childhood friend at Arizona State, he said he was impressed with Taylor’s football intellect.
“If a young guy or any guy struggled with the playbook, they would come to him,” Aaron said.
Taylor spent five seasons in the NFL as a wide receiver, bouncing around the practice squads of various teams. His most notable NFL experience came with the Cardinals in 2013, when he caught three passes for 40 yards, including a 17-yard pass from cornerback Patrick Peterson on a trick play.
“I’m just trying to use everything I’ve learned since the first day I ever played football all the way until now, to pass along to the players I’m coaching,” Taylor said.
