ENFIELD, U.K. — Sean Payton can remember his mother's message, even 37 years later.
Decades before he won a Super Bowl with the Saints or helped the Broncos back to the postseason, Payton was still putting on a helmet instead of a headset.
The former Eastern Illinois quarterback played in the fledgling Arena Football League and Canadian Football League after his collegiate career. He also briefly quarterbacked the Chicago Bears during the strike-shortened 1987 season.
By 1988, Payton was prepared to begin his coaching career. And then he received a call from the owner of the Leicester Panthers, an American football team that competed in the BAFA National Leagues in England.
"I can remember my mother saying, 'All of your friends are getting married, and they have health insurance, and what are you doing?'" Payton said Wednesday at Tottenham Hotspur Training Ground.
The Broncos' head coach remembers not knowing much about where he was headed, but he still remembers when the signing bonus arrived.
"It appeared in my checking account, and then I thought, 'Well, shoot, we're going,'" Payton said with a laugh.
Payton started at quarterback for the Panthers, and he said Wednesday that he "made some great friends" as he led the team to a playoff berth. The Panthers played on AstroTurf, and he remembers having teammates that worked a variety of jobs from contraction to serving as bouncers.
"There were four Americans per team," Payton said. "We would coach and play, and then practice would be [at] 5:30-ish. So, when everyone was finished working, we'd go for a couple hours and then play our games on the weekend. For them, it was the love of the game, and the four of us lived in a house. We'd go workout in the mornings, play some golf, put practice plans together. … We were pretty good."
The monetary allowance was a far cry from the NFL level, and Payton said he was "basically playing for pizza because you enjoyed it."
It didn't take long for Payton to transition from the Midlands to a legendary coaching career. He earned an assistant role at San Diego State later that year and would be working in the NFL within a decade.
"It's interesting, because you're going from playing to coaching," Payton said. "It was a graduate assistantship, and I just knew I wanted to be a coach. I thought I wanted to be a college coach, and then this league found you."
Less than two decades after his final season as a quarterback, Payton was the head coach of the Saints and nearing a Super Bowl title.
"It's easiest to say you want to play until everyone tells you to go home," Payton said. "So, I got to that point where everyone told you to go home, and then it's like, 'Well, I don't want to leave. What else can I do?' My dad worked in a suit every day, got dressed, took a bus to a train, train to the city, and I knew I didn't want to do that."
Payton likely won't get a chance on this trip to return to Leicester, though he did ask the team's bus driver on Wednesday about the distance back to his old town. While his focus is on earning the Broncos' third consecutive win against the Jets, Payton acknowledged "it's all the memories" that stand out even more than the pictures and old jersey he still owns.
"It was a good sixth months," Payton said of his experience. "It was nice."
