His dad and sister won state titles, but Tim Otton is fine with stopping T-Bird foes cold

Tim Otton doesn’t remember a moment when he decided to become a football coach.

“I don’t know that I ever thought of not doing that,” said Tumwater High School’s three-time Olympian All-Area defensive coordinator of the year.

Coaching is in his family’s DNA.

The oldest of Sid and Marjean Otton’s three children, Tim, now 54, watched his dad become Washington’s winningest high school football coach with 386 victories, claiming five state championships for Tumwater along the way. His little sister, Tana, hoisted four first place state trophies in volleyball, three at Tumwater after one at Meridian. Brother Brad was briefly the quarterbacks coach at UNLV.

But Tim is unusual among coaches of his caliber: He’s never been a teacher and he has no desire to become a head coach.

“I got into college (he played defensive end at Weber State) and took an education class,” he remembered. “They had us do some role-playing stuff. I realized ‘I am not going to become a teacher.’”

Switching his major to business, Otton now operates a chain of pizza restaurants in Southern California, Nevada and Utah with Brad, a former Tumwater and University of Southern California quarterback.

Nonetheless, after college, Otton returned to Tumwater, joining his dad’s staff as a volunteer, assisting defensive line coach Rick McGrath and breaking down film.

“Tim was like a lot of us,” said Sid Otton. “You love the game, so you play as long as you can and then you find other ways to stay involved.”

Sid was known for a calm, analytical demeanor. Everyone, from Tim to both his parents to current Tumwater head coach Bill Beattie, says he’s more emotional, can get more fired up, something that carries over to off field preparations.

“He was a volunteer and he was putting in more time than I was,” Sid remembered. “He did all the Hudl (video sharing) stuff, so he’d be up long after games on Friday nights.”

When Sid retired after the 2016 season, Tim gave scant thought to following him into the head coaching seat.

“Tim and I met before I even applied for the head coaching job,” said Beattie, another former Tumwater player and then the long-time coach at Olympia. “I told him if that was something he wanted, to follow in his father’s footsteps, I wouldn’t apply.”

But Otton knew his two sons, Cade, now a rookie tight end with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Ryan, now a freshman at Washington, would be playing in games he and his wife Sally, a former University of Utah swimmer, would want to see. His daughter Kylie followed her career in veterinary pharmacy to the East Coast.

He didn’t want to be locked into the myriad responsibilities of a head coach.

Plus, he admits, “the honest truth is, I knew Bill Beattie would do a better job than I ever could.”

So Otton became defensive coordinator under Beattie. His 4-3 defenses have allowed opponents an average of only 11.3 points per game, 3.7 in 2A Evergreen Conference play, recording 14 shutouts in 59 games. When Tumwater won the 2019 state 2A championship, the T-Birds allowed just 14 points total in the first three rounds of the tournament.

A player on Sid Otton’s earliest Tumwater teams, Beattie recalls Tim hanging out on the practice field, filling typical coach’s son roles like ball boy and water boy.

When Beattie returned as an assistant coach after college at Central Washington, he coached Tim in both football and baseball during an era that also included other players such as Tony Prentice and Doug Jones, who later joined the T-Bird coaching staff.

Longevity among assistant coaches is a plus, says Otton.

“Everybody knows what the standards are,” he said. “Being steeped in the history of the program makes it easier to understand our jobs. We have a great time coaching together and hanging out with each other.”

Tim Otton and Beattie never got out of contact, a plus for the current T-Birds.

“He’s a great leader,” said Beattie. “He’ll be the first to tell you he’s got a great staff to work with but he’s the guy who puts the vision together of what we want to accomplish on that side of the ball. He does a tremendous job of breaking down tendencies and formulating a plan that hopefully can neutralize an opponent.

“He’s enthusiastic. He’s intense. He’s competitive.”

Tumwater adjusts well to offenses on game night. Beattie says pre-COVID-19, the T-Birds platooned nearly every player so could adjust on the fly when the offense was on the field. With more players going both ways the last few seasons, the success of halftime adjustments has become more obvious,

Last season, Tumwater fell behind 28-0 at the half to 4A power Camas. After halftime, the Papermakers never scored again and the T-Birds made it a thriller before falling, 28-26.

“We’ve had Tony Prentice up in the booth, then Willie Garrow the last couple of years. They’re really good at seeing the big picture of what offenses were doing to us. Then, at halftime, we can get a little more detailed as to what we need to change in our scheme or personnel,” Otton said.

Otton makes sure to credit the guys who actually do the work:

“We’ve been fortunate to have really talented and terrific young men to coach on defense. “They’ve made us look very smart.”

Once the Friday night lights shut off each week this fall, Otton’s attention will shift to UW’s Saturday game and Tampa Bay’s Sunday contest.

Although Sid Otton, who was released by the Dallas Cowboys after an All-America career at Weber State and watched Brad suffer through an injury-plagued stint with the Washington Redskins, says “NFL” stands for “Not For Long,” no one is expecting Cade to be cut.

A fourth-round draft choice, Cade has caught three passes for 47 yards thus far during the pre-season.

Tim and Sally hope to see Tampa play road games at San Francisco and Arizona after the high school season ends.

“It’s really special. It’s surreal. In your wildest dreams, you never think your little kids running around are going to grow up to be Huskies or get to the NFL,” Otton said. “It makes for longer and more stressful weekends, but it’s also a great experience, following their careers, watching them grow.”

This story was originally published August 30, 2022 at 5:00 AM.