NFL

Ryan twins take separate paths to coaching success

Rex and Rob Ryan decided to go their own ways in coaching a long time ago, which makes the list of people who played under or coached alongside the identical twins a short one.

Then there’s Jeff Weeks, who is his own list altogether. Not only has the Jets defensive assistant played alongside and coached under the Ryan brothers, but Weeks also was their roommate at Southwest Oklahoma State in the early 1980s.

“I know this is really going to surprise you knowing Rob and Rex, but it wasn’t the quietest dorm room around,” Weeks recalled with a laugh this week. “It was pretty wild. They’ve always been larger than life.”

The twins will reunite on the field once again Sunday afternoon when the Saints — with Rob as their first-year defensive coordinator — travel to face Rex’s Jets at MetLife Stadium, and it’s a special moment Weeks knows will bring the memories flooding back for all three of them.

Like most who have been around both of the famously boisterous Ryan brothers in football, Weeks has his share of funny moments to retell. But in an upset considering their reputation, what he remembers most of all from those early days is admiring them instead of laughing at them.

“They were so far ahead of their time for their age,” Weeks said. “The thing that impressed me was, even as players, they talked like coaches already. Everybody else on the team back then was dreaming about playing in the NFL or maybe playing baseball or whatever, but these two were already speaking the coach language.”

That was the natural result of spending their entire childhood at the foot of their coaching father, legendary NFL defensive strategist Buddy Ryan, but Rex and Rob still bowled over their college teammates and classmates with their encyclopedic knowledge of the sport and the league.

Weeks said a favorite parlor trick of the Ryan brothers was to watch the NFL Draft in the early 1980s — long before Mel Kiper Jr. and every other average fan considered themselves an expert — and predict the first couple of rounds with almost uncanny accuracy.

“They had inside information, obviously, but it was still very impressive,” Weeks said.

Those football smarts only have grown since they went into coaching in 1987, but it took splitting their career tracks apart after an image-bruising stint under their father with the Cardinals in the mid-1990s for the reputations of Rex and Rob to finally take flight.

Although Rex briefly considered hiring Rob after Rob was fired as the Cowboys’ defensive coordinator last season, that two-year stint with Arizona — which had the look of nepotism and ended with Buddy’s firing — still is the last time they coached together.

It turned out to be the right move for both, as each went on to establish himself as a top NFL defensive coordinator. They did it separately but with the identical mixture of intelligence, hard work and humor that still inspires remarkable loyalty from their players and fellow coaches.

“Both of those guys will make you want to run through a wall for them,” said retired offensive tackle Damien Woody, who played for Rex with the Jets and was with the Patriots when Rob was linebackers coach from 2000-03. “They love their guys, and their guys love them.”

Those who have coached or played under the Ryans also all agree that, even though Rex and Rob are identical twins, they aren’t identical personalities.

“I know it might sound a little strange considering how they’re portrayed by a lot of people, but compared to Rob, Rex would definitely be the quiet one,” said Jets wide receivers coach Sanjay Lal, who coached alongside Rob with the Raiders from 2007-08 and credits him with boosting his career.

The differences are more visible now, considering Rex underwent lap-band weight loss surgery and looks almost like a CEO while Rob still unapologetically comes off as a pro wrestler on the sidelines with his beer belly, goatee and long, salt-and-pepper hair.

Players and coaches say Rob also is more of a stand-up comedian with his charges than Rex. A favorite ploy of Rob’s is to make sure his players are paying attention in meetings by slipping in funny or X-rated slides and showing strange videos between play diagrams.

“I remember one time in Cleveland he cracked the whole place up in a meeting by showing a picture of himself in a tutu in Vegas and saying, ‘How did that get in here?’ ” said Jets receiver and return specialist Josh Cribbs, who played under Rob with the Browns from 2009-10.

Though the Ryan brothers are known as practical jokers, it’s obvious those who have played or coached under them are laughing with them — not at them.

“You might be able to find people on the outside who criticize them or say this or that about Rob and Rex, but not if you played for them or coached with them,” Cribbs said. “With both of them, it’s all respect.”