DECATUR, Ala. — Like many head coaches, Jere Adcock grew up being a huge sports fan.
"As a little kid, I would sit there, you know we didn't have any the stuff you have on TV now, but I would sit there on Friday night [and] if I couldn't go to the local high school game, I would sit there and listen to it and I would listen to it with a piece of paper and I would draw [the plays]," said Adcock.
Years later, Adcock would put his drawings into action. In 1980, he took his first job as a volunteer assistant at his alma mater, Handley High School, in Roanoke, Ala.
After finishing his undergrad at Auburn University and working as an assistant coach for more than 15 years in different locations, Adcock became the head football head coach at Decatur High School in 1996 and he never left.
"Kids pour so much into us that we couldn't do what we did if they didn't didn't do what they do for us," said Adcock.
After more than 40 years of coaching and 27 years as a head coach, Adcock has decided to retire.
He ends his career with 187 wins and seven region championships. Adcock also coached four guys that ended up in the NFL, but it is the memories surrounding relationships that stick with him the most.
"We had a player [in 2000] whose sister had cancer and passed away during the pregame meal...and they call me to come and get him [and] take him home. He didn't know," said Adcock. "He and I were close, but that day was one of the things, as much as you wished it hadn't happened, I thank God a thousand times that I was there when it did."
Adcock is now a grandfather of eight, soon to be nine, and said he is ready to move on from coaching and for life's next chapter.
"I'm at that stage in my life where I got an opportunity to do something else, possibly. [I] still have a ton of energy and a ton of desire to be successful at something and [I'm] willing to take some challenges and find out what I can do."