If you happened to watch the Thursday night matchup between the Packers and Bears, you may have noticed the throwback beer commercial featuring John Madden. Miller Lite resurrected the class commercial to celebrate its new “Steinie bottle,” which was featured in the original 1981 spot.

Madden spoke with For the Win about the commercial, the Cowboys quarterback situation and the NFL’s cracking down on celebrations.

Miller Lite is bringing back the commercial that really introduced you to a national audience. Is it surreal seeing that again after all these years?

It’s fun to see them bringing it back. We’re talking about something that happened nearly 40 years ago, but it was so much fun to do. When you did one of those commercials — whether it’s an individual one or a group one — it was about as much fun as much you can.

YOU HAD a LOT OF SUCCESS AFTER COACHING, BUT Was there ever a time when you came close to returning to the sideline?

No there wasn’t. At that time, I remember Vince Lombardi was my idol, and he coached nine years. You didn’t get paid a lot of money, so it was kind of a 10-year deal. If you were a long-term earner, you coach for 10 years and that was it. When you got to the point where you’ve won every game there was — playoff games, championship games, Super Bowl, Pro Bowl — all you could do is do it over it again. You may as well get on with the rest of your life.

The money wasn’t like it is today. There wasn’t much difference between what you made as the head coach of an NFL team and the next door neighbor, who did whatever. We were all very middle class. I had opportunities to go back to coaching but at that time, I had gotten claustrophobia and I was having trouble flying. I got some feelers but turned them down.

So what was it like going from the grind that is coaching in the NFL to A LESS STRESSFUL LIFE?

I didn’t know what I was going to do; I just wasn’t going to coach. I was going to spend time with my family, and, lo and behold, they had other stuff to do. So I’d be home, and it be me and the dog! So I figured I better do something else. I started speaking, then the Miller Lite commercial came along. Miller Lite was one of the first things that I did after coaching, and that got me into another life. Then I was John Madden, the commercial guy breaking through the wall. “Drink Miller Lite. It’s less filling. Tastes great.”

I really enjoyed that. That was fun. The Miller Lite commercial got me into the broadcasting. So I went from coaching to commercials to doing television. So there was no break after spending some time with the dog. I had plenty of things to do, and I enjoyed them all.

Did broadcasting scratch that coaching itch at all, since You’re still around the game, analyzing it, talking to players and coaches?

No, it didn’t. Anyone who says it does is a liar. Broadcasting is so much easier. Coaching’s hard. Coaching is hard work. You just look at those guys — and I respect the hell out of them for the job that they’re doing. It’s a lot tougher than the job that I did. But you don’t get the highs and the lows in broadcasting, because you don’t win.

That’s the whole thing with coaching: You go out there each week to win a game. The ones that kill you are the losses. Losing sucks. You work as hard as you can for 20 hours a day to come up with anything to win a game. When you’re a broadcaster, believe me, the guys that are really working hard preparing, they don’t do one-hundredth of what the coaches do.

The thing that I missed coming out of coaching was being around the guys. I always enjoyed being with the guys, hanging out, laughing, teaching, coaching — stuff like that. I did miss that. In broadcasting you have a team. It’s a lot smaller team: producer, director, play-by-play guy and so on and so on. But it never replaced the itch to coach. Not at all.

Let’s say you were in Jason Garrett’s shoes. Tony Romo is getting close to healthy, but they are winning with Dak Prescott. How would you handle that situation?

Not being there and not knowing the exact situation, I’ll say what I would do and not what they should do. I always went with the hot hand. [Prescott] looks great to me. I watch him and he wins and nothing looks too big for him. He looks like he’s been there. He’s very, very impressive. I think it would be tough for them to make a change. If I were in that situation, I wouldn’t make a change.

There has been a lot of talk about player celebrations of late. You were in the booth for maybe the most famous celebration of all time: Terrell Owens’ Sharpie. Do you remember what your reaction was at the time?

You see him going over to the stands and grab something, and you don’t know what the heck he’s going to do and what he’s grabbing at. So, as you’re talking, you’re just kind of watching. You react to it as you’re seeing it. I was surprised. I was shocked he had a Sharpie out there, and I probably — I mean I don’t exactly remember — but I probably thought it was pretty funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3tssXf2RrQ

Do you think the league is cracking down a little too hard with these penalties for celebrations?

I always say the NFL is a copycat league, and usually they are talking about plays. If there’s a certain passing grouping or way to run the ball, it doesn’t stay yours for very long. But it’s also a copycat league in other ways. When the celebration gets so much play, they play it over and over and over. These guys today all want to be branded. The way to get known is to get a close-up, individual shot. The way to get an individual shot is do a celebration. Ten years later we’re still talking about Terrell Owens and his Sharpie.

You just can’t let the dish run away with the spoon. If one guy does something, someone else always wants to do more. So you kind of have to put your arms around it and put parameters on it, and just make the players stay within that. And I kind of agree with that, because we’re a league of football, a league of competition. Celebrations don’t come first — they’re secondary to the game. I don’t think anyone who is really worried about these celebrations is really worried about football.