To say SMU cornerback Derrius Bell’s 2009 season got off to a rough start would be an understatement. Illness forced him to miss the team’s season opener, and the following week, he was knocked unconscious in the Mustangs’ victory over UAB when he was picked up on a corner blitz. The ensuing bye week allowed him to get back on the field against TCU, where he got his second concussion. Bell’s game and season were over.

Many assumed that his football career was over, as well. As it turns out, his football playing career was over.

Once a key cog in the SMU secondary, Derrius Bell said he will use spring workouts to get his feet wet in coaching (photo by Travis Johnston).

But Bell said this week he plans to be back out on the practice field this spring … as a volunteer coaching assistant. After coming to grips with the fact that he would not play again, he began to consider the idea of coaching. He talked to SMU defensive coordinator Tom Mason, and agreed to come out to spring workouts, to help out in whatever way he can.

Not playing was hard for Bell. He was kept informed about the goings-on with the team by his roommate, wide receiver Aldrick Robinson, and his other friends on the team. But watching was hard. He only attended two games this season, watching the rest on-line or on television.

“That was very hard,” Bell said. “I had a really hard time going to games. I felt like I should be out there helping.”

Bell said he began to think like a coach when he watched his teammates. He didn’t assume he could have broken up every pass that got completed against the SMU defense, of course, but said there were times when a pass would get completed and he could see how a change in defensive technique might have altered the outcome of the play.

Bell isn’t even sure whose idea it was for him to start working with the coaching staff this spring.

“I’d say it was pretty mutual, I guess,” he said. “I want to say it was me, but I don’t know. I talked with Coach Mason and it came up.”

Bell is closing in on his sociology degree — he said he’ll graduate either in August or at least December — and said the career that now appeals the most to him is coaching.

“I need to come back and get involved with the team again,” he said. “When I wasn’t playing last year, something was missing. Football was missing.”

Bell laughed when asked if his former teammates would have to refer to him as “Coach Bell.”

Had he remained healthy, Derrius Bell would have been a senior in 2010 (photo by Travis Johnston).

“I don’t know about that,” he said. “Maybe some of the young guys, but they were my teammates. I hosted Chris Parks on his recruiting visit. That would be a little strange.”

Bell said, however, that he is confident he can share his experience with his former teammates.

“I know I have some things I can share, especially with the younger guys — I know that,” Bell said. “It would be more about technique, but also about how serious every play is, how serious every game is, because any play could be your last. I know that. I should have been playing my senior year this year, but it didn’t work out that way.”

Bell said that he doesn’t think about the hit against TCU that essentially ended his playing career (although he does admit to occasionally thinking back to the UAB hit two weeks before). But he said that if asked by some of the current Mustang defensive backs, he will not encourage that they take a different approach.

“It’s the mentality you have to have — playing aggressive,” he said. “A lot of times, a receiver will miss the ball just because of the respect he has for you. My dad taught me early on that if they do catch the ball on you, punish (the receiver). You have to be smart and tackle the right way, but you can do that and still be physical.

“I’m going into this spring just trying to get my feet wet in coaching. But if I can get that across, I think that will be my main thing.”