LAYTON — When it comes to coaching high school football, Erik Thompson's unbridled enthusiasm and sincere love for his job, and for his players and fellow coaches, is truly remarkable.
It's also contagious.
Heck, spend 15 minutes talking to the Northridge High head coach, and you'll want to go suit up and try to get back on the field again yourself — even if you're a horribly out of shape, 60-something-year-old guy whose last experience on the gridiron resulted in a separated shoulder while playing a "harmless" game of flag football more than 25 years ago.
But hearing Coach Thompson speak with such passion for the game can make any such adversity — and much worse — seem completely worthwhile. Indeed, you see, it's simply the chance you often take and the price you sometimes pay for playing this great game of football.
And in a recent conversation with him, Thompson admitted that being a high school coach whose job security and daily mood — perhaps even his downright mental stability and sanity — rest primarily on the performance of a bunch of teenage boys can be, well, more than a little stressful at times.
But he feels it's darn well worth it.
"It's a tough job being a coach," he admitted. "There's something wrong with us. I think most coaches secretly like the pressure, they like the grind. There's something fun about trying to do something that other people think you can't do.
"And, really, one of the funnest things about high school football is that every year you kind of start over. And it's that race during the year: Can you get your guys bigger and stronger and to work harder and to like each other?
"You've got to be a psychologist and a mom and a dad and an equipment manager and all these things rolled into one besides the Xs and Os," he said with a smile. "And when you wake up every day, it's like you'd better hit the ground running and be ready to go and be fired up and try and get a lot of stuff done. And I love that rush and I love that about my job."
Thompson is in his 12th season as the head coach at Northridge, having compiled a solid 71-47 overall record there following Friday night's season-opening victory over Viewmont.
He served as an assistant coach at the school on Fred Fernandes' staff from 1998-2003, when the Knights went on a glorious run and brought home three straight state championships.
Fernandes was Thompson's position coach in high school, when Fernandes served on the staff of Erik's father, Fred, at Roy High School.
So Erik has learned his coaching lessons well — the Xs and O's, as well as the psychology and ability to get the most out of his players -- from the two Freds, two of the best guys you'll ever have an opportunity to meet.
Thus, it seems, coaching has been in Erik Thompson's blood for his entire adult life. Yes, he comes by it right, being the son of a longtime coach who still works as an assistant on Erik's staff at Northridge, where Fred Thompson coaches the linebackers.
Ah, yes, coaching. It's a job which certainly has it's great frustrations, as well as its great rewards.
And the ever-upbeat Thompson prefers to focus on the latter.
"Even if you're not winning games, there's always that grind and that excitement of having something new every day, and I think I've got my dream job," said the Northridge coach, who adds that having a great group of young men like the ones he's got this year can certainly make a difference in a guy's level of enjoyment.
"Definitely coaching kids like this makes things a little bit more fun.
"Sometimes it's not always fun to coach, even though I always love it. And this is a fun group to coach," he said.
Coach Thompson said success on the field often comes down to two factors — two factors which he and his staff have absolutely no control over.
"I think the two most important things in football are luck and health and, unfortunately, they're the two things you can't control," he said. "That's probably why all us coaches are paranoid and on edge all the time, because the things we know affect the game the most we can't really control.
"So we're gonna try and focus on the things we can control — and have a lot of fun doing it."
After all, if it wasn't fun, he wouldn't be doing it.
But for guys like Erik Thompson, it's almost as if he's getting paid just to do something he loves, something he's good at and something he has such a great time doing.
Sure, it's a job, but it's a joy to do it.
Kinda like being a sportswriter.
EMAIL: rhollis@desnews.com