Edition: U.S. / Global

A Late-Comer Is Off To a Very Fast Start

By GERALD ESKENAZI, Special to The New York Times
Published: September 14, 1989

It took Bud Carson 33 years to become a head coach in the National Football League, and just one game to learn to worry when you win by 51-0.

Carson is 58 years old and he had long ago given up hope that someone would hire him as a head coach.

Too temperamental, too erratic, not a company man, undiplomatic in his news conferences after games were the raps against him, Worst of all, Art Modell, the owner of the Browns, said today: ''Bud had left the Pittsburgh Steelers in the middle of their Super Bowl years. Why would anyone do that unless there was something wrong with him? At least, that's what people thought.'' Good Reason

The reason, it turns out, was that he had been lured to the Los Angeles Rams by their owner, Carroll Rosenbloom, who held out the promise of an eventual head coaching job, an offer that wasn't realized when Rosenbloom died.

Last January, Modell plucked Carson from the relatively obscure post as the Jets' defensive coordinator and made him the coach of the team with the American Conference's best record over the last three years.

''Art Modell is taking one of the great gambles in N.F.L. history,'' Al Davis said when he called Carson to congratulate him. ''You're taking over a club that's been to the playoffs four consecutive years.''

The reasons were compelling for Modell, though. Carson reminded him of Blanton Collier, the 58-year-old perennial assistant Modell had chosen to replace the legend, Paul Brown, as the Browns' coach in 1963.

''When you get a 58-year-old coach, he knows it's his last chance,'' explained Modell. ''A younger coach figures he screws up, he gets another chance.''

So what did the Browns do in their opening game last Sunday to mess up Carson? They won big over Pittsburgh, so big that by the third quarter, Carson started to worry.

''I was concerned about the Steelers' coaches,'' he explained. ''I had started coaching in the N.F.L. in Pittsburgh and I knew how they felt.''

Now he has more concerns. His Browns return home for next Sunday's meeting with the Jets, his first game against his old team. ''Everybody has their Super Bowl,'' he said today in Cleveland. ''And this is mine.'' But he still is worried about his own players and wonders if they will keep their instensity.

''I've got bad films scheduled the night before the game,'' he said, planning to bring the team back to reality. He doesn't, however, have any videotape from the Steelers' game that would make his players look bad. So he found preseason footage against Phoenix and Tampa Bay. Enjoys Making It

Still, Carson says he enjoys finally making it. Was it worth waiting for? ''The first game was,'' he said today. ''I'll let you know after the season if it was.''

Carson says that he has learned to measure his words. Perhaps.

In training camp, he created a local sensation when he moved Hanford Dixon, one of his two Pro Bowl cornerbacks, to free safety. Dixon actually wanted the shift, but Browns fans were shocked when Carson described Dixon as slowing up ''and not as good as Frank Minnifield.'' Now Dixon has moved back to the corner at Carson's insistence.

''I realize now the decision shouldn't have been made in the first place,'' he said.

Head coaches in the N.F.L. are rarely caught admitting mistakes, but Carson has always shown his feelings. People around him in Cleveland say he is no different just because he runs the team. College Veteran

After 14 years in the college ranks, Carson was hired by Chuck Noll in 1972 as the Steelers' defensive coordinator. He introduced the double-zone to the pros in 1973, and the Steelers produced a club-record 37 interceptions.

He left for the Rams in 1978 and was their defensive coordinator when they went to the Super Bowl within two seasons. Over the next few years he also coached at Baltimore and Kansas City, before Joe Walton asked him to take over the Jets' defense in 1985. Last year, with a young club without a legitimate pass rusher, he created blitzes and other attacking styles.

Their youth dismayed him, though. He ripped players in public and rarely hid his feelings after a game.

''I have to show the players loyalty now,'' he said. ''I didn't have to worry about that as a coordinator. The players could read what I said and I wouldn't have to repeat myself at the meetings.''

Photo of Bud Carson conferring with Paul Lanham (NYT)