Former high school, college and NFL star steps away from coaching for all the right reasons
When Napoleon Kaufman walked away from professional football prior to the 2001 season after six years as a running back with the Oakland Raiders, it wasn’t to become a high school football coach. The reason was Kaufman had found a different calling as a Christian minister.
“I could have played another six years,” remarked Kaufman, who at 46-years old still looks like he could suit up and run the football.
By retiring and forgoing however many seasons he could have still played, he also walked away from several million dollars, but Kaufman knew what he wanted in his future, and he sort of just stumbled into coaching football along the way, starting first with Pop Warner in the Pleasanton/Livermore area and then at Bishop O’Dowd-Oakland six seasons ago.
“What happened was my oldest son (Napoleon Jr.) was at the school and they knew me,” Kaufman said. “The job was open and Athletic Director Mike Boler reached out to me and asked me if I was interested in interviewing for the job.”
Now, after going from the gridiron to the pulpit, and back to the gridiron for those six years at O’Dowd, and while still holding the position of Senior Pastor at The Well Christian Community in Livermore as well as Team Chaplain of the Raiders, Kaufman is ready to move on and concentrate on the original reason he left the professional football.
“It’s a new season for me,” Kaufman remarked. “It just doesn’t include football.”
Will he ever consider coaching again? To that question Pastor Kaufman had a simple answer. “No.”
With Kaufman leaving the high school coaching scene it may be the last time we ever have the pleasure of telling the story to those who don’t know anything about his entire history as a player, coach and pastor, so we’re here to give you a chronicling of the journey.
When the news was leaked to the media last week after he told the team he wouldn’t be returning next season, the social media world was speculating that one of the reasons for his leaving was because his son Nehemiah, who played running back on this year’s Dragons team, is graduating.
The realty is nothing could be further from the truth. When Kaufman began thinking about leaving the coaching ranks after the 2017 season, Nehemiah wasn’t even playing football. Plus Kaufman and his wife Pastor Nicole Kaufman, who is the Children’s Ministry Director at The Well, still have the last of their four children Natalia at O’Dowd where she is a sophomore. Middle son Nathanael also graduated from O’Dowd.
“My deciding to leave coaching had nothing to do with O’Dowd or my son and daughter,” Kaufman remarked.
“Coaching football for me was doing the best I could to teach the kids the game of football, but also about teaching kids about life and imparting principles that will help them in life,” Kaufman continued. “My son aside, and the kids will joke about it, but I called all those kids my sons. Coaching football has never been about my kids it’s been about all the kids.
Ask a couple of his seniors and you’ll find out Pastor Kaufman is not making things up.
“In my three years of varsity football I could have never have had a better coach,” said this year’s team MVP Jayden Davis. “Coach Kaufman preached building young men of character and cared about us more than just football players. Coach made everyone accountable for their actions in preparation for the world ahead. On the field he helped bring out the best in his players by sometimes putting us in uncomfortable situations we had to overcome.”
“Coach Kaufman has personally brought things out of me I didn’t think I had in myself,” continued Davis. “It’s easy to run through a wall for somebody who pushes you to do your best and wants you to succeed. I thank coach for all he has done for me and hope the best for him and his family.”
That kind of stuff can’t be made up nor can this.
“Coach Kaufman worked to develop us as people,” said Colton Vardell, the son of legendary Stanford star, NFL running back and O’Dowd assistant coach Thomas “Touchdown Tommy” Vardell. “He’d always tell us that the hard work we were putting in wasn’t just about football it was about life. The accountability and discipline we learned on the field we would carry on to our jobs, families and other things in life.”
If you want know the truth the real answer can be found by visiting The Well like I did last week to interview Pastor Kaufman.
The Well is like a small city and even on a Tuesday afternoon while not overflowing with the over 1,000 community members that regularly attend Sunday services from all parts of the Bay Area and as far away as Fresno, it was still buzzing with activity.
Things have changed significantly since Pastor Kaufman and his Christian community first opened the doors of The Well in a 2003 in a 110-seat sanctuary in San Ramon. Before we sat down in his office for the bulk of the interview, Kaufman gave a tour of the 83,000 square foot facility that he and the church’s followers built and opened in 2013 after gutting a Comcast service facility near the Livermore Airport.
After seeing The Well it was obvious that things have changed even since 2013, and the enormity of the job of being the Senior Pastor and all the things that come with it are a tremendous task. The bottom line is with everything it takes to be a head football coach, which in a lot of respects is a year-round job, was something he could no longer do in unison with his pastoral duties.
“I was sensitive in knowing when it was time to move on,” Kaufman said. “I said this from the beginning when I took the job that my priorities are my family and my church, and when I started to feel like it was time to focus more on my family and church I had to make a decision.”
“It won’t mean I won’t be around the school or I won’t be at games,” continued Kaufman. “It’s just the responsibility that comes with being a coach I can no longer do all three things that I was doing.”
The tour of The Well began with Pastor Kaufman introducing his staff and then moved on to a large area near the entrance to the church where people gather before Sunday services.
The area for children’s activities was next and it was a big as a gymnasium with dozens of chairs and two pianos and other band-like instruments with adjacent rooms for other activities. The room set aside for young adults, many of whom are or were O’Dowd students like current Stanford running back Austin Jones, had lots of things young people like to do including playing band instruments.
From there we went to the Community Outreach Center which is more like a food bank for community and church members on hard times. Shelves were stocked with an assortment of staples and several industrial size refrigerators and freezers were filled with meats, chicken, sausages, vegetables and many other items. It’s there we first met Pastor Nicole Kaufman who was busy with several other members of The Well sorting, prepping and even cooking food.
At last we entered the sanctuary, and the picture we took of Pastor Kaufman there for the feature can’t describe the enormity needed to seat 1,000 people.
“We have a very diverse group of worshippers,” Kaufman said. “We could have a CEO sitting next to someone sleeping in their car.”
After seeing what Pastor Kaufman is responsible for at The Well it’s almost remarkable he lasted six years at O’Dowd, but there’s more. He is on the radio every day, is currently getting ready to write two books, and his ministry also includes going into San Quentin State Prison some 60 miles away to work with incarcerated inmates.
The pride of Lompoc High (Santa Barbara County) gained notoriety as a 5-9, 170-pound running back with 4.3 speed that had his high school career culminate in 1990 with his being named the Cal-Hi Sports Mr. Football State Player of the Year and a USA Today First Team All-American.
Kaufman was also an exceptional track athlete. As a junior he was the CIF state champion in both the 100 (10.57) and 200 meters (21.15). He also was an accomplished long jumper with a personal best of over 24 feet.
From Lompoc Kaufman went on to Washington and is the Huskies second-leading all-time rusher (4,106 yards), plus he holds several other rushing records that got him elected to the University of Washington Hall of Fame.
With the Oakland Raiders his 227 yards in leading the Raiders to an upset of the undefeated and eventual 1997 Super Bowl champion Denver Broncos still stands as the franchise mark for rushing yards in a single game.
This season was a bit of a downer with O’Dowd eligible but not getting selected for the CIF North Coast Section playoffs, but the previous five were glorious indeed.
Kaufman inherited a team that had a losing record and although the 2014 team only went 5-6 they made the playoffs. In 2015 the Dragons were 7-5 and went to the NCS Division 3 semifinals.
Kaufman’s 2016 team went 15-1 and won the NCS D3 title, the first section title in 18 years for O’Dowd. From there they went on to win the CIF state Division 5-AA Bowl Game championship with a 43-24 victory on the road at Valley View-Moreno Valley.
For his achievements Kaufman was awarded a Preppy by Prep2Prep as the Northern California Male Team Coach of the Year.
In 2017 his Dragons went 9-3 and lost in the NCS D3 semifinals to the Marin Catholic-Kentfield team they beat in the 2016 title game.
Last season Kaufman and his boys went 12-2 and beat Marin Catholic 16-15 in the NCS Division 2 championship, but because the fires disrupted the NCS playoffs O’Dowd could not advance to a CIF Bowl Game since both the Dragons and Marin Catholic opted to play the game rather than flipping a coin to see who would move on to the state playoffs being played at the same time as the NCS title games.
Despite going 1-2 against him in NCS playoff games Marin Catholic Coach Mazi Moayed is a good friend and confidant of Kaufman. Moayed talked to Kaufman during the 2017 season when he was contemplating stepping aside.
“I met him when he started coaching at O’Dowd and we became excellent and really close friends,” Moayed said. “During the 2017 season he told me he was strongly contemplating leaving after that season but he decided to stick around one more year. But at this point he feels his calling is to give more time to his family and ministry.”
Kaufman leaves O’Dowd with a record of 51-24 and two NCS championships, and one CIF state title, but according to Moayed he’s also left an indelible mark on the Dragons program.
“They always had talent at O’Dowd but the play on the field changed dramatically when Napoleon came in,” Moayed remarked. “The energy changed coupled with a high level of competitiveness with great respect for the opponent.”
Vardell, who assisted Kaufman for three years, saw it this way.
“What Napoleon provided was a clean, consistent, stable environment for our kids, which demanded accountability and aimed to reflect true life as it truly is,” Vardell said. “There were never going to be exceptions to the rule, reward without work, or partiality toward the best players. He had a vision for the program, and for the team, and for the roles of individual players and coaches. The basic principles of his system reveal proof that people can be loose and have fun and at the same time be productive, accountable, and do the right thing.”
Cal-Hi Sports Editor and Publisher Mark Tennis, who named Kaufman Mr. Football State Player of the Year in 1990, had this to say.
“We need more guys like Napoleon Kaufman,” Tennis remarked. “They coach four, five or six years, don’t do it for the money and then move on. It’s great. Look what it gives back to the kids.”
“Napoleon is one of the best human beings I know in the world,” Moayed said. “He’s genuine and as real as a person can get. I know he really cares about the people surrounding him and that rubs off on the coaching staff and players. I love that guy. He’ll be sorely missed in high school football.”
At the end of the interview and tour of The Well Kaufman escorted us to the parking lot where we embraced. “So long coach,” we told him “and it’s the last time we’re going to call you coach.”
Pastor Kaufman smiled, turned and walked back through the doors of The Well to continue his first season without football in a long time.
